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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 8475647" data-attributes="member: 6790260">"Barbarian" in my campaign is mostly used for the nomadic herding culture (or, rather, collection of related cultures) beyond the eastern mountains, in the highland steppe. The main region of the game, the Tarrakhuna, is of Middle Eastern/Arabian Nights flavor and tone, heavily inspired by Morocco, Al-Andalus, and classic pre-Islamic and Islamic folklore. The eastern steppe is poorly known by the people of the Tarrakhuna who see little benefit from trade or cultural exchange to the east, hence the term.Notably, however, the Tarrakhuna has two branches of its culture: the city-folk and the Nomad Tribes. Historically speaking, all free mortals (humans, elves, dragonborn, etc.) were once nomads, eking out a hardscrabble existence in the monster-filled, arid/desert wilds between the cities that were ruled by the capricious and often cruel genie-rajahs. After the genies departed the mortal world to live full-time in the elemental otherworld, Al-Akirah (the mirror of the Tarrakhuna region there thus became called "Jinnistan"), some mortals chose to keep living the nomadic life while others took over the old genie cities or (in a few rare cases) built new ones. Because of this kinship and the historical origins of mortal culture, on top of speaking the same language and sharing major religious traditions, the Nomad Tribes are still considered "the same culture," and it is an incredible insult to call a Nomad a "barbarian." (City-folk may still look down on them etc. but they usually aren't stupid enough to mock a Nomad to her face, and likewise many Nomads see city-folk as decadent and corrupt.)So, "barbarian" has only a relatively small place in my setting, while "Nomad" is actually a pretty important subculture distinction and carries a lot of meaning, especially for some of our party members (the Druid and Ranger are both Nomads themselves, and the Bard lived among them for several years as a travelling storyteller and myth-weaver.)</blockquote>

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