Very thorough and excellent.
Thanks!
Can I make a couple of Taladas-based additions?
Sure! Great additions!
For Oceania etc. in Taladas there is also the Payan Mako (definitely - the Shark People are really just a problem the Payan Mako are having rather than a separate culture) and at least arguably the Cha'asii/Wild Elves (albeit maybe they're "just elves").
I added Payan Mako. I found the word "mako" is Maori for "shark." Yeah, the Shark People live in the same islands, so they're part of that culture/milieu. I may add the Cha'asii since their language said to be related to the Payan (~Krynnish Maori!) language. But I need to look into it more.
And there's an Inuit analogue in the Ice People too
Definitely. Will add them.
Most of the other stuff is analogous to cultures not listed. I feel like the Ilquar Goblins and the First People Ogres are analogous to some culture but I'm not able to pin it down (both are playable and largely neutral or positive in their portrayal).
Looking at the "Wretched Ones" / Ilquar Goblins -- yes their fate is similar to the oppression of Indigenous Americans, yet from their wiki article, I don't see any motifs or names which are directly tied to a specific culture. The head flattening could be indicative, but there were several nations which practiced that. It seems likely they were generally meant to evoke the oppressed aspect of Indigenous American history.
The First Ones / Abaqua Ogres are more clearly an Indigenous American archetype, as seen by the names of their various Peoples, and the term "warchief."
I noticed just now the Merkitsa Elves, which are said to share the culture of the Uigan humans. So they would be ~Mongolian too. One of the Merkitsa warriors is named "Ulan", which is real-world Mongolian for "red" (the capital of Mongolia is named Ulan Baatar : "red hero")
The Saqualaminoi are intended to be friendly Yetis, but I don't think that quite counts as Nepalese/Tibetan!
Hmm...I'm looking into it. Their name in the Ice People language is "Sakalaminuik", which is quasi-Inuit in form. Yet their appearance (white fur) and habitat is very similar to real-world myth of the Yeti / Abominable Snowman of Himalayan lore. And to add a further twist, their other name, "Saqualaminoi" is clearly inspired by the "Sasquatch" (a.k.a. Bigfoot), which comes from an Indigenous North American language: either the Nlaka'pamuctsin language
se'sxa or Halkomem language
sásq’ets. Both are languages of British Columbia, Canada. I'll ponder how to untangle these motifs.