Gnoll Mercenaries

The phenomenom of **Gnoll Mercenaries** has been seen more and more in recent history. At the earliest point in known gnoll history, they were considered mere beasts, not even worth training or doing anything but hunting them down. We have no registered attempts by the Khenomeric Empire to train, domesticate or even tame them, though their information regarding gnoll has mostly been lost. From what we know, the gnoll were basically fodder for nobles seeking some game more exciting than mere deer or boars, which would come to haunt them once the ogres managed not only to tame them, but to “civilize” them into an cohesive force strong enough to take and overrun the empire. It is only after the ogres’ cultural influence spread thoroughly throughout the Gnoll Empire, and after the aggressive expansion started after its first emperor ended, when we can see the first examples of gnoll mercenaries.

The way they can appear, though, is more complicated than it seems. While most of the inner workings of how gnoll society works remain a mystery, there have been witnesses to the gnolls’ uplifting from mere animals to something akin to a civilized beings. The drunig historian, Taulenco Gos, wrote about his brief stance in the Gnoll Empire, back when the Kingdom of Drunigzar sold ships to the gnoll in the open.

According to “*Tales and horrors from my days in the ruins of the city of Cothelk*”:

> “We saw many hyena-gnolls tied to ropes and chains, and some even had their legs broken, so that they couldn’t charge their custodians. They were fat, bloated beyond what one could imagine such things to be. Their breath was difficult, spewed blood and were in clear, excruciating pain. […] Their cries and howls of pain indicated the agony of the creature, and I could not help but to feel pity for them. […] The beast outside was being devoured from within by the beast inside, and it was only a matter of time until they get free. […] When the fully developed gnoll is born, it carves its way out of the living body of the hyena-gnoll that spawned him. During that state, it is pretty much a wild animal: a ball of teeth, claws and rage that will attack anything that it sets its eyes on. To begin the instruction, the ogre (or another civilized gnoll) beat up the newborn into submission, until it understands the hierarchy, or dies fighting it. Those who do not submit will never be anything more than wild, rabid animals, and are killed on the spot, used to feed the newborn. However, there is always enough gnoll to keep a steady supply of potentially civilizable gnoll. Once they have learned the pecking order, they are introduced to a hellish routine of learning things such as their language, basic rules of conduct, their faith in the Maw, and other such things. All while beating them senseless at the first sign of defiance. […] This process lasts as much as the gnoll needs to learn whatever skills he’s been fit to learn, or as much as it takes for the beatings to kill the gnoll.”
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From this, we can assume that all documented gnoll mercenaries have been inducted in this form of education at least once in their lives, since a gnoll without this formative process would not have enough self-control or knowledge to be able to organize into any collaborative work, much less with non gnolls. The question is whether they received from the Gnoll Empire’s administration, independent gnoll packs or from other sources. Now that many know that gnolls have the potential to be civilized, there is nothing really stopping a crazy enough mercenary to hunt down a hyena-gnoll and try to bend the adult gnoll into submission. Granted, the whole ordeal will most likely end up in death, but the potential is there.

Many civilized gnolls do abandon from the line of battle, either to hunt down enemy stragglers and fugitives, to seek food or a myriad of other reasons, gnoll’s obedience to orders not being their strong suit. Many have theorized that this could cause many gnoll to gravitate into groups, which would act like gnoll packs, only with civilized gnolls instead of feral ones. They would orbit around a particularly strong member and live as bandits, thieves and other form of criminal. This has been proven to happen more often than previously thought, such as in areas like Old Nogar, where many gnoll bandits have set up their bases, fighting the packs of feral gnoll and the few human populations still there.

All this can explain the existence of gnoll bandits and gnolls within bandit groups. How then this can evolve into organized work, is a much murkier subject. Over the decades, there have been plenty of cases where mercenary bands who use one or two gnolls. The most frequent use of gnolls by mercenaries is just capturing feral gnoll in the wild and just siccing them on whatever they are fighting, or using them as a distraction to outmaneuver the enemy. The problem with this approach is the gnoll contamination of the land: gnoll release maggotgnolls when they die, so just throwing them out to their dooms is going to guarantee a gnoll infestation later down the line. While not impossible to eradicate nowadays, these are always costly affairs in both time and manpower, especially watching over the area so as to avoid any surviving maggotgnolls from spawning more of their kind.

It is much rarer to find civilized gnolls within mercenary bands. This particular gnolls are either more intelligent and collected that the majority of their race (which doesn’t stop them from being uncontrollable and aggressive on occasion, just makes it manageable) or have been beaten into submission to accept the leaders’ authority. Mercenary groups who do this usually do not get more than a handful of these to their forces, since the inherent difficulties with controlling and ordering gnolls becomes apparent. However, gnolls can be surprisingly cheap manpower: they need no gold, they only fight for food, violence and part of the loot. As such, if the problems of control can be overcome, they become a very economic option for mercenaries in desperate need for manpower. Gnoll mercenaries are well known to pillage the weapons of the fallen in the battle, since their equipment is usually horrid and low quality, so after a couple of fights, if the gnoll survives he will have armed himself, saving costs in equipment.

Mercenary bands comprised entirely of gnolls are extremely rare, and only have been recorded a handful of them. Since very few people would be willing to take their chances with a gnoll-only force, they are only hired by the madman and the desperate, which it doesn’t really well for either one most of the time. In general, they will orbit around a singular leader, perhaps an undead gnoll, with enough strength, charisma and self-control to not only keep himself together, but to also deal with terms of service with other payments.

## List of Gnoll Mercenary Groups

Here is a list of known independent gnoll mercenary groups currently active. Most of these do not identify with the given names; they were labeled by 3rd parties after identifying the different factions. The numbers of members of each mercenary group are wildly varied, depending on the rate of attrition and recruitment at the time. Their current whereabouts are also not known, since they never stay in the same place.

### The Oldbones

The Oldbones are the oldest company of mercenary gnolls known, appearing immediately after the death of Grabagrorr the Great, the first gnoll emperor. The first time they were sighted was in the Kingdom of Ketlovia, around a decade earlier than “the Last Dance”, beginning the invasion of the kingdom. At the time, the ketlovians were growing restless about the state of things in the borders, with skirmishes between the ketlovians and the gnoll growing in frequency. However, at the time, the werewolf king still thought he could avoid the war with the gnoll, since the death of the aggressive Grabagrorr and the rise of the Nameless meant the slowing down of the invasions, such as in the Cowmen Grasslands and the lands of the Ra. To try to gain the favor of the new emperor, he hired the Oldbones to fight banditry in the Ivory Peninsula. The king made a token effort of arming them and giving them enough resources to fight crime, while also escorting them to watch over them. His logic was that the emperor would see the gnoll were somewhat respected in the kingdom, and he was confident that it, alongside other token shows of respect, would be enough to stop the war-hungry gnoll This misplaced confidence would cost him dearly, losing his daughters, most of his kingdom and his sanity.

The Oldbones were led by undead gnoll, one of the first documented cases of this kind of leadership structure within mercenary bands. This allowed them to be more calm and collected, with the undead leaders keeping the regular gnoll at bay, and this gave the ketlovian authorities a false sense of security. Latest sightings of them show that they still use a lot of equipment and tactics taught by the ketlovian, and their faith is a mix of worship of the Maw and some ketlovian customs. Their last sighting was in the Great End Peaks, assaulting some of the towns in the mountains.

### The Chaindancers

The Chaindancers are believed to have been formed from gnoll that fought in the Wars of Heaven between the Gnoll Empire and the Goddragon Phorsiussarx. The extreme rate of attrition the Gnoll Empire faced to subdue the goddragon meant that many waves of gnoll were sent over and over with no effect. Many gnoll were uplifted into undeath for this campaign, since the complexities of the warzone and mental fortitude needed to face the goddragon required a more focused mind. Despite all of this efforts, the Nameless’ plot to subdue the dragon through maggotgnolls imbued by dark magic was what finally broke Phorsiussarx’ resolve, admitting defeat and surrendering. Many of the undead gnoll were branded with a special glyph in their heads by the Emperor himself, to commemorate the victory. This mark is the only thing that indicates us that the Chaindancers came from these days, but the earliest documented sight of them as mercenaries occurred much later, raiding the seashore towns of Voita around the 3.020 ABE, many years before its unification with Malagsh.

The Chaindancers have seen many times in the southeast of Giantstep, usually as pirate raiders or brute muscle fighting for local warlords. They have specialized in quick assaults during the night, scaling with ease town and city walls and moving from roof to roof to reach the undefended rear from above before the enemy can react. This unusually smart way of fighting is attributed to the high number of undead gnolls within their leadership, allowing them to analyze and plan their attacks more coherently. The rumors that they have been in contact with the pirates of Künt is yet to be confirmed.

### Acolytes of the Maw

The Acolytes of the Maw are one of the few gnoll mercenary bands who have a set base of operations. They can be found in great numbers at the edges of the Suritas Range, serving whatever seguerial hive or Gökmavi warlord needs extra muscle against their enemies. They are one of the most numerous as well, growing their numbers with many pilgrim gnolls, looking to find something to fight after their voyage to the Maw. This also turns the Suritas Range a very dangerous place to be, since travelers will have to pay a toll to cross the mountains, which usually translates into sacrificing a member of their group to feed the chasing gnolls. They frequently raid the hives of the Seguerials, finding little resistance to their aggressions. This has made the gnoll very well fed for their kind, attacking the surface and underground populations and feeding on the defeated seguerials. Their raids against the Gökmavi are less successful, since the horse raiders can outmaneuver the gnoll in the steppes.

Since most of them come from the pilgrimages to the Maw, they are more zealous than the average gnoll, and will offer frequent tribute to the Maw.

### Swarm of Maggots

The Swarm of Maggots are a mercenary band that mainly act in the regions north of the Forest of Getting Lost. They have been seen quite frequently in the Cloaked Kingdom, as their lawless land is a great fit to find enough mercenary work to live comfortably. It’s not really known how they managed to end up in the area, but nevertheless, they are frequently seen fighting the gangs and murder cults in the region. They are a particular sore spot for whatever passes as authorities in the kingdom, since they do not follow the rule of the Monarch, and have been marked for extermination. This doesn’t stop them from being hired by the many gang, though they need to be careful to not be backstabbed, since the Monarch has a prize on their head.

The dark druids of Drouchont also hunt the gnolls. Always in need for new sacrifices, the gnoll are sometimes lured into the dark forests of Drouchont to fight a seemingly great beast, only for many gnolls to disappear from the group, never to be seen again. The close contact with the druids has somehow made the gnoll learn a few druidic tricks, in particular the production of certain types of poison. They imbue their weapons with quick acting poison that makes their target’s body feel numb and slow, becoming easy targets for an enraged gnoll. They have also been known to poison their target’s cattle as well, to starve them before attacking. However, they would rather avoid doing that, since they value captured cattle much more than any other material prize, and they would rather keep it intact so as to capture it whole, allowing them to eat the animals without interruption.

## Gnoll Corps

**Drunigzar’s Gnoll Corps** is the biggest anomaly when it comes to gnoll mercenaries. A full force of professionally trained gnoll soldiers, organized and funded by a nation other than the Gnoll Empire, it is something that still baffles many experts. The fact that this unit is successful and proven in the battlefield, let alone possible at all, makes nearly all nations increasingly worried, and has become a contentious point even within Drunigzar’s politics. Many of the details of how this came to be, or how it works, is a very zealously guarded secret, but we do know enough to make appropriate guesses.

The origins of the Gnoll Corps can be tracked to the drunig king Paolos III “the Explorer”. At the time, the death of the first gnoll emperor and the arrival of the Nameless to power had slowly been changing gnoll politics, from a non-negotiable threat to all other nations to a still dangerous entity that could at least be talked to. The Nameless’ project of establishing diplomatic relations with everyone willing was seen by most as a death trap, and was near universally denied, with the exception of the Okhostian Necrocracy, which already had ties to the gnoll. Paolos was in the middle of planning the expansion of the borders of Drunigzar through the colonial projects, but for that it needed to make sure their borders were guarded. The transformation of most of the armed forces into the Expeditionary Force meant that their land borders could be threatened, since it was a body designed for quick and decisive attacks, not long conflicts (especially when far from navy support). With Nogar having been crippled with their war with the gnoll and Anchovia being seen as a non-threat, the only real worry Drunigzar could fear in regards to a land war was a gnoll invasion. Seeing this, Paolos III took a great gamble and concerted a reunion with the Gnoll Emperor to set the terms for an alliance. The drunig diplomats went to the city of Cothelk, a port city previously in the border between the Ketlovian Kingdom and the Khenomeric Empire.

The diplomats were received warmly by the Gnoll Emperor, who had come in person to receive them as a show of trust. He proposed a very intricate alliance between the Gnoll Empire and the Kingdom of Drunigzar, but after the dignitaries brought the news back home, most of the court rejected the plans. They saw it as “too good to be true”, and feared that such a strong alliance with the gnolls would turn Drunigzar into a pariah state, something they could not afford. Paolos III responded to the gnoll with more modest terms, which basically limited to trading ships in exchange for treasures and lost items from the Khenomeric Empire (plus whatever raw resources they could mine from the land), a compact to fight piracy in the Carisibi Sea, and a non-aggression pact. The Nameless was willing to accept these terms, on the condition that, as a sign of trust, the drunig would incorporate to their armed forces a unit made entirely out of gnolls. After a lot of discussion with the knights and the royal military advisors, Paolos III accepted the terms, and thus the Gnoll Corps was born.

The recruitment and organization for the Gnoll Corps is relatively simple. The Gnoll Emperor handpicks the gnolls who will comprise the force, and are sent to Drunigzar by ship. These gnolls are chosen not only by their proven strength, but also their composure and intelligence. These gnolls need to follow a rigorous discipline many times more intense than what they could ever find in the Gnoll Empire. As such, anything but the best self-control won’t last without lashing out against their superiors (the Gnoll Emperor himself gave his explicit permission to execute any gnoll to prove a threat to the corps or their handlers). There cannot be more than 1.000 members in the Gnoll Corps at any given time, and thus they have to be thoroughly drilled, even if they are not allowed to deploy in numbers higher than 200 soldiers in the same battlefield. They are put through a rigorous routine of physical training, to burn some of their more aggressive tendencies through sheer physical exhaustion, as well as put through many trials where they’ll have to learn the basics of military tactics: unit cohesion, marching in formation of squares or columns, charging in a triangular shape to break enemy formations, flanking the enemy, and one of the more difficult for the gnoll, organized disengagements and retreats.

All throughout their training, they have to prove they can obey the orders of their superiors, least they become uncontrollable in the middle of a battle, and any gnoll unwilling or incapable of following orders is executed on the spot. The drunig authorities do not teach them anything beyond that, both because the gnoll barely have enough patience and attention for this, and because they do not want to give too much knowledge to them in case they become a threat. As such, in terms of weaponry, they are offered a plethora of different weapons, and are taught in the one that seems the best fit for them. The gnoll’s equipment is not unified, they are allowed to carry their preferred weapons into battle, which mostly consist of close quarters gear like axes, swords, daggers, maces, hammers… Attempts of teaching them to use lances have been tried, but since their loadout is not unified, they cannot really have the advantage of a square of lances. They are given quality weapons, though, and also armed with quality armor whenever possible, since training a gnoll is a long and difficult process, and the drunig would want to keep their investment as safe as possible.

Their use basically consists in supporting drunig squares, either as an assault force to defeat an enemy unit weakened by gunfire, or to distract the enemy long enough to allow the members of the Expeditionary Force to outmaneuver the enemy safely. While the drunig high command considers the members of the Gnoll Corps expendable in comparison to their own troops, they will at least make the effort of keep them alive as much as possible, so they will avoid sending them in waves against the enemy. Gnoll ferocity and lack of fear in a charge means that they can be quite effective against gunlines, and even assaulting fortified positions, since they won’t stop by a mere volley of gunfire. This has been proven in fights in the ruins of the Merfolk Empire, where many pirate feuds have been overrun by the gnoll, who charged their position regardless of the danger to themselves.

Once a gnoll is considered to have served their time in the Corps, they are allowed to go back to the Gnoll Empire, keeping whatever armor and weapons they were given. The Gnoll Emperor guarantees a special place in the nation in exchange for their valuable services, since the knowledge and experience are near unparalleled within the Gnoll Empire. In exchange of trying to teach their knowledge to the gnoll armies, they are granted undeath by the Nameless himself, and are even allow to spew their maggotgnolls within one of the sacred herd of Fleshox. In a special ceremony, these are sacrificed by the gifted gnoll, both a way to preserve his legacy and to get meat worthy of sacrifice to offer to the Maw. Some gnolls decide not to go back to the empire, deciding instead to stay in Drunigzar as private guards, or sail to the world in search for mercenary work. The majority of them do go back to the Gnoll Empire, since their loyalty to the Gnoll Emperor and to the Maw is still great.

After many decades of training, the Gnoll Corps had become a very competent force. They had proved to be very effective fighting pirates alongside the navy, especially in the expeditions to Leng or the ruins of the Merfolk Empire, where some pirates had set up bases of operation. They proved to be even more effective against boarding from pirates, since the last thing they expected when boarding the drunig ships was gnolls clad in armored and itching for blood. The Gnoll Corps needs to work effectively with the navy, and as such, they have to get used to life in the sea, as well as ship warfare. However, many still believed this force was more dangerous than it was worth, both from a military and a diplomatic perspective. As one of the extremely few nations willing to deal with the gnolls and the Gnoll Empire, Drunigzar has received severe blowbacks to the idea of the Gnoll Corps. However, most of the criticisms from within the nation were silent after the War of the Lord Descented, where the Gnoll Corps distinguished themselves with courage and honor. In particular, their surprising resistance towards the matter known as “reality” means that Gnoll Corps units are frequently seen in the drunig colonies within the Pinewood Peninsula. The gnolls can also release part of their ferocity against the occasional raids from the crazed zealots in the area, since the drunig authorities consider the effects of “reality” in the local populations as irreversible. This also makes the drunig settlers from the colonies of Cabakritinnii, Cabakonninni and Bibile much more open and less frightened of the gnoll, since many considered their contribution indispensable for their survival in the war.