Halfling-Giant Alliance (HGA)

Country Name: Halfling-Giant Alliance (also known as Mimax, the Southern Alliance, the HGA, or Lemba-Midnat depending on who you ask)

Population: 90% Halfling, 8% Giant, 1% Dwarf, 1% Other (mostly Human merchants living in the coastal cities)

Capital: Jotundale, a city founded between their ancestral homelands

Goverment: Democracy-Gerontocracy Fusion

### **Culture**

An integrated society of halflings and giants with halflings forming the bulk of the population mostly as farmers and the giants usually being the warrior and ruling classes. In the middle of the nation there is the most amount of mixing from the two races, with the homelands of the two skewed toward the native race, but with a portion of the other race living there.  Due to its isolationist nature, most humans know little of the nation's culture outside of outdated stereotypes, but in fact, the Halfling-Giant Alliance contains many different subcultures:

Rural Halflings:  The most stereotypical halfling culture, most rural halflings are down to earth folk who prefer a simple life of working as much as needed to support a decent lifestyle, while avoiding the endless race for more wealth and power common in urban areas.  This has resulted in them being stereotyped as lazy and short-sighted, however, their communities are in fact well organized and frequently meet to discuss future plans.  Although many are skilled and patient craftsmen, most of highest value crafted goods exported from the HGA are in fact created by the Old Blood Halflings.

Old Blood Halflings:  A little known subculture of halflings, the Old Blood are even smaller than normal halflings, and infamously secretive.  However, they possess a large amount of influence in halfling society thanks to their knowledge of magic, and great wealth gathered from selling potions and enchanted goods.  Their main magic school, the "House of the Tineling Wizards" is said to be built on one of few leyline nodes in Westerasi.

Urban Halflings:  Urban halflings are a subculture that has resulted from the frequent contact between humans and halflings.  It traces its origins back to halflings who escaped or were liberated from slavery, as a result, it contains strong traces of the human cultures that employed slavery of halflings, particularly the Belara-Morloux region.  Although many urban halflings bear strong grudges against cultures that once enslaved them, they also have embraced some of the worse aspects of human culture, particularly unrestrained greed, and have developed a reputation for trading anything with anyone.  All sorts of races can be encountered in halfling coastal cities, including oni, naga, dwarves, gargoyles, goblins, and merfolk, though humans of Westerasi and Celestial origin are the most common.  The role halfling cities played in the Morloux-Nulamore slave trade is still seen as a black mark on the reputation of the halflings.

Wyrd Halflings: The halflings who live near the border of the Wyrd have always had a certain reputation.  Although similar to other rural halflings, their communities are small, isolated, and some say prone to inbreeding.  Strange creatures are said to live in the areas where they are found, and more than one halfling horror story features a degenerate clan of Wyrd halflings making sacrifices to unknown entities.

Church Halflings: Although most halflings are pretty casual when it comes to religion, some halflings have taken to the Church of Divine Duality faith very strongly.  They can be easily recognized from their elaborate cloths, delicate coiffures, and tendency to wear face paint.   Their ridiculously appearance and evangelical nature means most other halflings treat them as a nuisance, but over the centuries they have gradually built up a decent sized following among social outcasts and individuals naturally inclined to be bossy or self-righteous.

Giant Doers: Generally made up of younger, more aggressive giants, they are the ones that serve as laborers and fighters in HGA society.  They are fairly active compared to Giant Thinkers, but tend to rely on either Thinkers or halflings to provide direction to them.  They are strongly motivated by the thought of food and those that live away from Thinkers generally take food as payment for services.  They have a simplistic, child-like view of the world, and although intimidatingly huge, are generally not aggressive unless sorely provoked.  They are shorter and stockier than the Thinkers, and some grow quite obese if they are particularly successful in receiving food in exchange for services.

Giant Thinkers: Thinkers are generally older than the Doers, though many Doers never become Thinkers, and some Doers become Thinkers much earlier than others.  They are generally taller and thinner than Doers, taller since giants seem to grow throughout their lifespan, and thinner because they rarely seem to eat.  Unquestionably the leaders in giant clans that have them, they spend most of their time deep in though, often remaining stationary for hours contemplating what actions the clan should take.  Although fairly intelligent, both their thought process and speak patterns are incredibly slow, and non-giants find them frustrating to interact with.

### **Religion**

Halflings are generally non-religious.  When they think of such issues at all, most communities follow a very flexible interpretation of the Gloria-Etalia faith that basically comes down to "if you contribute to your community, you are a good person, if not, then not so much".  Marriages, funerals, and the like are generally conducted by respected community leaders rather than representatives of an organized religion.

The Church of Divine Duality and the Lemba Chapel are the two main organized denominations of the Gloria-Etalia Faith in the HGA.  The Lemba Chapel is popular with Old Blood Halflings and certain urban communities due to its lack of ties to human communities, but many rural halflings find it to be overly political.  The Church of Divine Duality is more geographically widespread, but its strict theological doctrines don't appeal to the relaxed and casual way of life followed by most halflings.

Strange pagan faiths sometimes crop up in the more remote halfling communities, Notably Wild Lord and Wyrd worship near the Wyrd, and followers of Mokla Ka-li, Quilio-Fil'zón, the Sea God and many other strange aquatic faiths in remote coastal communities.

The small dwarven communities in the eastern and western mountain ranges still have their own faiths.

Religious sites associated with the cultures of visiting human merchants are fairly common with many coastal ports featuring temples to the Celestial Faith, various Gloria-Etalia faiths, and the Cult of the Sea God.

The giants seem to have even less interest in religion than the halflings.

### **Organization**

The government is made up of two parts: the representatives and the crown. The crown is made up of a giant who takes on the role as tribemaster, and a halfling who takes on the role of king or queen. Once elected, they rule until death unless the representatives all agree to dispose of them.

The halflings are largely democratic with each settlement electing town council who in turn elect a senator. The giants simply have an age based hierarchy where the oldest rule and the 27 oldest form the 'wise council' who are the counterpart to the halfling senate.

In practice the halflings tend to manage much of the day to day running of the country while the giants mostly serve as advisors (their long lived letting them be living history repositories) though the giants are the bulk of the military and direct in times of war.

### **Origin**

Halflings and giants have been around as long as anyone can remember.  The Old Blood Halflings sometimes claim they are the ancestors of all other halflings, though this claim is usually ignored by others.  Others claim that halflings and giants were somehow deliberately created by an ancient human culture, though both halflings and giants take offense to this theory.

##### **Pre Union**

The halflings always lived in fear of slavers from the north coming to take them away as they are terrible combatants but make excellent farmers and craftsmen.The giants, while big and strong, could not support their constant need for food in big groups, and when to small they were hunted down and their children sold off as slaves as a giant broken as a child makes a wonderful slave laborer/status symbol.

##### **The First Union**

One day a cunning and enterprising halfling named Lifferkin who, in his campaign for mayor, approached a small and suffering giant tribe and offered them food, weapons, and shelter in exchange for guarding and protecting the halflings. The newly appointed giant elder, an old and half-blind female named Urte took stock of her remaining tribeskin’s chances, and agreed. In her mind, they had nothing left to lose. He then brought them back to his village to show the other halflings the “solution to all of our problems!” as his slogan went. While there were many halflings unconvinced that the plan was going to work, they decided to hear him out and went on to feed and arm the giants. When some slavers came for easy prey, they were met with well equipped giants, and were easily crushed. Lifferkin was quickly elected mayor, and continued to integrate the giants into halfling society, implementing them as construction workers and excavators. Soon other towns across the border started to hear about Lifferkin’s new policies that were making his town flourish, and invited giants to join their towns as well. Soon both giants and halflings were living together, and slavers became a smaller and smaller menace, even though people were sometimes still caught. Urte was living now well past her expected lifespan due to her newly forged security, but she was not content. Being wise, she saw the village’s solution had only driven the slavers away to halflings that could not protect themselves and giants that were easily preyed on. Seeing this, she proposed to Lifferkin, who has kept his position as mayor almost as long as any halfling in remembered history due to his policies, that the independent villages along the border join up to become a greater threat to those that would wish to harm them. He was skeptical at first, but Urte wore him down, and they both proposed their plan to “unionise” to the other villages. With some convincing, they agreed, and the halfling-giant villages formed to create the first kingdom their land had seen. They called it the Halfling-Giant Alliance.

##### **The Birth of the Halfling-Giant Alliance (Circa 4200)**

Soon enough a government was formed. Each village sent a representative to start to create laws and policies. These representatives were mostly giants, who knew how to work together for the benefit of their tribe, but a small number of those sent were halflings. They met with Lifferkin and Urte, who they proposed that in order to govern efficiently, they should elect one giant and one halfling to run the kingdom with the titles of Tribesmaster and King, with the representatives acting as a counterbalance to their power with a council power of their own. After some debate, they agreed that someone has to run this new kingdom, and everyone having a direct voice was inefficient. So they agreed and elected Urte and Lifferkin as the first Tribesmaster and King.

Their first policy enacted was to get more villages to join up, and envoys were sent to both the giants and the halflings. One by one, villages were convinced, and halflings and giants were sent to integrate into the two societies. Soon enough they turned their eyes north, where slavers were still a big nuisance that they were fed up with. Their solution: build a giant wall stretching the border to keep them out. They hated the Westrasi people, and wanted nothing to do with them after being preyed on for so long. It took many years, but soon enough with giant prowess and halfling ingenuity a wall started to go up. Litterkin and Urte died, but others rose to take their place. After many decades, the wall was complete and the two races were united. Urte and Lifferkin are still celebrated as national heroes to this day, for uniting the tribes and solving a near-impossible problem.

### **Diplomacy**

The HGA is the most popular target of pirate raids by the Black Island Pirates, it goes without saying that relations are poor.  Despite this, Black Island Pirates do sometimes trade with the more free wheeling halfling port cities.

The HGA has trading relations with many coastal nations along the south and west coast, particular Morloux, the Celestial Empire, the Merchant League, and Lahaila, though it generally stays out of conflicts between these nations, and many halflings still harbor grudges against humans in general.

The HGA has rather cold relations with the human nations along its northern border.  Lahaila and Uoro are mostly ignored, but minor skirmishes with the Araxians and the Yoroi (or more specially Vashian soldiers posted along the southern border of the Tribelands) are not uncommon.  Raids by Sarcians, goblins, and molemen from the Wall of the World mountain range are frequent, and all out war with Yoroslova happens at least once every couple of decades (along with countless raids and skirmishes).  The Wyrd is weird, and most halflings prefer to think it doesn't exist.

### **Geography**

Much of the HGA region is dominated by warm, dry forests, but mountain ranges in the east and west have boreal forests instead.  The HGA region is well inhabited in the north, but progressively less inhabited in the southeast, though the giants there make up for their lack of numbers with sheer individual strength.  Halfling areas are densely covered in villages often a leisurely walk from each other (except along the coasts and near the Wyrd, both of which are sparsely inhabited except for coastal cities).  Market towns and coastal cities are fairly common, but less so than one would think for a large, well inhabited nation.  The largest city is The Border City of Tunko'tto (though only about a quarter of it falls on the HGA side of the border).  The only city away from the coast is Jotundale, located along the old boundary between Lemba and Midnat.  Giant dominated areas are generally in the southeast but away from the coast.  Giants in these areas are semi-nomadic, so there are few permanent structures.

### **Economy**

The HGA is self sufficient, but participates in the lively coastal trade that passes between the human parts of Westrasi, and the nations along the southern coast.  Magic goods from the Old Bloods, and crafts and high value produce from the rural areas brings in good money, as does serving as middlemen between many western and southern merchant companies.  Most of the money ends up with the urban halflings, who either hoard their excess money, or spend it on foreign curios.