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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Nyeshet" data-source="post: 4416965" data-attributes="member: 18363">Other considerations ...I'm not sure how multi-racial you intend your society to be, but here are some ideas that might work for you. The initial barbarians to the north were not completely wiped out. Instead the menfolk were the heaviest casualties, and when the women, children, and elderly saw the direction the battle was going, they escaped to the north and east, eventually fording the river branch that heads north some miles from Golotha and entering the hilly region beyond. In the modern times they may have several villages there, or there may be wandering bands there with legends of what happened so many centuries ago. These initial northern barbarians were wild elves or wood elves. Due to some inter-marrying (or, more likely, inter-breeding) between the slave populations (both from captured barbarians and southern village members) there is a slight strain of elvish in the local population. Every so often it becomes focused enough that a half elf is born. As so little knowledge exists of the pre-destruction era in the modern day, these individuals are typically seen as gifted - with exceptional long life, better senses, and so forth. Several prior leaders - and therefore some of the nobles - were half-elven born of humans. Indeed, the prevalence of half-elven children is higher amongst local nobles (not foreign nobles) than amongst non-nobles due to the rarity of marriage between noble and non-noble. Also, as some half elven children were born to children of converts to the new religions, some of the priest family lineages have a strong half-elven tendency, as the parents of the new converts would have seen the 'blessing' upon their children as a gift from their new patron deity (and perhaps it was, depending on the deity). So presume a small but notable number of the population is half-elven, but also presume that the population does not consider them a separate race - having not yet come upon a community with a large elven and half-elven population. They presume such individuals to be blest or favored in some manner. The current northern barbarians are orcs or hobgoblins. (Or, you could use the half-orc or half-hoggoblin traits and simply call them orcs / hobgoblins, as many GMs I know [including myself at times] occasionally do.) Some amongst these tribes occasionally stop by the ruins to trade with the various criminal elements - as such are typically the only ones willing to sail north around the marshy and ruined areas to risk doing business with such persons. The criminals receive rare hides, ivory, and such in exchange for metal items, woven clothes, perhaps gems and so forth. There might be some drugs and medicines also being exchanged between these groups. Most of the settlement considers the orcs very dangerous, and those found to have traded with them are often presumed to have given them information on weaknesses the orcs might later exploit to destroy the town. And indeed some orc traders may very well wish to gain such information. Trading is often sporadic and irregular, but it is possible a criminal organization has arranged a year or seasonal trade with one of the nearer tribes of orcs. Orcs / Hobgoblins - when seen in town - are treated with suspicion if not outright hostility, but on rare occasions they have been seen in town. The lands to the south are a mystery, but it is possible that dwarves live in the arid and mountainous regions farther south (Ternum Heath, I think the region is called on the Harn maps). As the elves exist in the north and east, it is possible that trade might exist with a village of (pure blood) wild / wood elves, so such may not be entirely unknown - although if said elves ever learned the origin of such traders they might become hostile towards them (due to their tales regarding the decimation of their people during that period). Indeed, it is possible that some of their oldest members might have been children who watched as their fathers, uncles, older brothers, etc were slain by the undead horrors unleashed upon them by the city. Gnomes and halflings present a bit of a problem, but if you follow the 4e idea regarding halflings, then perhaps you could place small mobile floating villages of them in the various swamps along the river.</blockquote>

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