Creative Exercise--Aleasana

[JimAde]

The grasslands are home to the Bodai, a nomadic, herding people famed for their horsemanship and ferocity. They produce the finest woolens known on their portable looms.

 

[Desdichado]

Another prominent mercenary group is Aleasana is the Black Fist Brotherhood, an exclusive organization of half-orc monks and rogues who serve as shock troops, assassins, and blockade runners for anyone who will pay their price. The Black Fist Brotherhood believes in an almost religious philosophy called the Way of the Black Road, a quasi-mystical regimen of physical and mental training based on the Five ...

Although not a requirement for membership in the Black Fist Brotherhood, many of them come from a large Imperial nation far to the Southwest that is peopled almost entirely by half-orcs that have bred true for so long that they had almost forgotten about the existence of humans and orcs as their ancient forebears. The Brotherhood, while also a highly profitable mercenary organization, also secretly serves as the advance guard and scouting forces of this Empire, perhaps as a prelude to invasion.

 

[Tonguez]

Let's tie down some more geography...

Aleasana's Southern border is the Sun's Anvil Desert. Rumors abound of what lies beyons, but nobody has ever ventured there and come back alive. Between the mountains and the desert lies a strip of arid grasslands. On the far Northern border, the mountains blend into a frozen wasteland of ice and stone. On the East and West, Aleasana is flanked by two large oceans.

The Twin Cities of Karina are most unusual for they are a single city split in two locations. The Lower city sits at the base of the mountains overlooking the Bodai grasslands as such the lower city is the main trade access for Bodai textiles and salt from the southern desert. This city is dominated by merchants and governed by the Provost of the Merchants Guild

The upper city sits 3000 ft above the lower overlooking two stategic passes through the mountains. The upper city is the home of the ruling elite of the city known as the Council of Judges who determine law for the city below. The Upper city also features a number of libraries, temples, a university and a museum. The two cities are magically linked by the 'Gate of Judgement' a two-way portal constantly guarded access through an archway in the wall of each of the twin cities

 

[Arkhandus]

Let's tie down some more geography...

Aleasana's Southern border is the Sun's Anvil Desert. Rumors abound of what lies beyons, but nobody has ever ventured there and come back alive. Between the mountains and the desert lies a strip of arid grasslands. On the far Northern border, the mountains blend into a frozen wasteland of ice and stone. On the East and West, Aleasana is flanked by two large oceans.

The eastern ocean is known to most as the Olden Sea, as most of Aleasana's peoples sailed here centuries or millenia ago from the east when their homeland was ravaged (by what, few know). The Aleasani displaced many lesser peoples when they arrived, forcing some northward into the tundra and south into the desert, most of whom have not been seen or heard from for quite a while. The vast Olden Archipelago fills part of the Olden Sea southeast of the Aleasana mountains.

 

[Rhialto]

The Bodai, a short race popularly called "halflings" by the Aleasani, and the Juni, a similar race popularly called Pygmies or Gnomes, are among the aboriginal inhabitants of the land who the Aleasani displaced when they arrived here. Others include the Shey, popularly known as elves, to whom only a few cities remain (among them Karina) but who have managed to treat with the humans, and the Dvergar, or dwarves, a grim race of warriors and wizards who have remained hostile, even as their strength dwindles. There are also the Northeners, another race of men, to whom the sophisticated Aleasani feel even less kinship then they do for the Shey. Finally, there are the Urukh, the mysterious, brutish race to which the Black Fist Brotherhood belongs.*

*Let's simplify things. Instead of a nation of half-orcs who've bred true, let's just have half-orcs being orcs in this setting. If you feel I've gone too far, just say so...

 

[Tonguez]

*Let's simplify things. Instead of a nation of half-orcs who've bred true, let's just have half-orcs being orcs in this setting. If you feel I've gone too far, just say so...

We could declare Orcs to be an extinct species and the half-orcs the only sign that they ever existed (thus leading to rumours of fell mingling of human and beast to create the 'Orcnei')
Also can we change the name Orcnei to something kewler. Shey, Juni, Bodai and Drueger are all good - but Orcnei! How about Urukh
(PS also is it too much to say that within Aleasana Orcnei/Urukh are considered to be 'human' to the same degree as the Northern Barbarians are 'human')

 

[Sarellion]

It´s your thread and it sounds ok.

Many people believe that all human spellcasters had a non human ancestor somewhere in their ancestry as iron sickens all non humans and all spellcasters.

Another theory is that it was a gift by the faerie to humans, so they would stop using iron against them in a mythical war long ago.

 

[Rhialto]

We could declare Orcs to be an extinct species and the half-orcs the only sign that they ever existed (thus leading to rumours of fell mingling of human and beast to create the 'Orcnei')
Also can we change the name Orcnei to something kewler. Shey, Juni, Bodai and Drueger are all good - but Orcnei! How about Urukh
(PS also is it too much to say that within Aleasana Orcnei/Urukh are considered to be 'human' to the same degree as the Northern Barbarians are 'human')

I like your name better. Urukh it is. And I'd say that as in low regard as the Aleasani hold the Northerners, they still recognize them as more human than the Urukh, who--well, are clearly something very different...

 

[Conaill]

The present conflict has its roots in an earlier war. A war fought with sound.

Just reviving an earlier detail...

Occasionally, some ancient artifacts from this long-forgotten war are found. Most are nonmagical or only faintly magical and constructed of strange materials. The best known example is a 20' pearlescent copper parabolic dish in the Eastern city of Lugan. Part of the dish seems to have been turned into a glass-like crystal and shattered long ago. If anyone has managed to get one of these artifacts to function, they're not telling...

In the far northeast, it is said there is a mountain called "Guardian of the North". A hole has been crudely cut straight through its peak, and when the northern wind blows, an eerie wail washes over the frozen lanscape.

 

[Arkhandus]

I really don't think the half-orcs should appear, let alone be treated as, just another kind of 'human'. Their appearance is rather different, and it'd just be lame to make them seem more human to where there's no difference between a half-orc and a northerner barbarian except for the half-orc's darkvision.... And it would take away from the mystique of the half-orc ninja...... :^D I don't care if orcs are extinct or just rare, but I really liked the idea of the half-orc nation that's nearly forgotten its human+orc roots....

The half-orcs should probably have a distinctly Aleasani accent though signifying their distant link to the original Aleasani invader-colonists. ......and you know that Urukh was taken from Tolkien's uruk-hai, the man-orc halfbreed 'supersoldiers' Saruman created, right? I think it might be better to use a different term. The old Norse term for orcs (yes, Tolkien actually based on them on old myths, they were not pulled out of thin air) was orich or orichar (latter was the plural if I recall). Could use that or something for either orcs or for half-orcs. Or make up something completely new like was done for halflings and gnomes (incidentally).