Fantasy Races: Rivalries And Alliances, part 2

The Proud Herons And The Sagacious Apes

Kyo and kai-tang civilizations have different norms and ideals. Kyo culture is extrovert, expansive, hierarchical, emphasizing success, wealth, luxury, prestige, social advancement, and face. For kyo intent of an action is of lesser importance than following the prescribed forms. Kai-tang society is rather introvert, egalitarian, composed of semi-isolated groups with little desire for expansion, emphasizing intellectual honesty, spiritual development, and enlightened action—kai-tang are expected to understand intents that drives the action and balance the means and results of the action. Despite this differences, societies of both races are mostly meritocratic, rewarding individual achievements and capabilities with respect and prestige.

When kyo and kai-tang met, there is an obvious distance between each other. Kyo view ape-men as archetypal noble savages—creatures holding certain wisdom and grace that partly redeems their uncivilized (i.e. non-kyo) ways and grant them a measure of respect, but savages nonetheless. Kai-tang pity kyo's obsession with hierarchies, wealth, and social stance, as straining and hindering their intellectual and spiritual integrity and advancement. Both appreciate the interaction with the other to a certain degree, as an exotic distraction and an instructive moment (even if the lesson learned is usually picking aspects aligned with their own culture and avoidance of following the ways of the other race in matters that aren't similar already). The perceived exotic savagery and their physical strength combined with intelligence makes kai-tang mercenaries popular supplement of the Radiant Empire forces. A number of kai-tang settlements became protectorates of the slowly expanding Radiant Empire, retaining a high degree of autonomy, with some minor organizational glitches related to imperial expectation of having single directors clashing with kai-tang preference for selected associations performing equivalent roles together.

While the trade between the two races exist, it is sometimes frustrating to kyo merchants because of kai-tang philosophically driven assignment of values to goods and services. This splits kyo merchants into two camps: those who are irritated by dealing with kai-tang, and those who got used to kai-tang approach, treating it as a game with its own unique rules and forms.

The Winged Merchants And The Curious Swimmers

The xenopi are a real conundrum to kyo. Are they beasts of the sea only incidentally capable of communication, with a semblance of culture created via cunning mimicry? Or are they a really weird sapient beings to whom normal behaviors of sapient races, such as family bonds, sexual mores, material possession, and social divisions are alien concepts? Resembling a common sea food does not help solve that dilemma. From their side, xenopi are eager to help kyo reach mutual understanding between their people... Which of course confuses the matter, as xenopi have hard time understanding many crucial aspects of kyo life themselves. Why exchanging things is so important to kyo? Why social rank is that important to kyo? Why would low rank kyo follow what high rank kyo instructions if it does not agree with the instruction... And so on, and so on.

Kyo merchants do visit xenopi settlements, acquiring some xenopi produces via exchange of gifts, a process less reliable than regular trade or barter, but occasionally being very profitable. More than one minor kyo peddler earned a fortune by acquiring ingots of rare metals or high quality pearls from xenopi that had no foreseeable need for them. Curious xenopi are more than happy to join kyo merchant crews on their voyages to travel far and wide, and sometimes kyo merchants even agree to such requests, hoping that exotic nature of xenopi pet will attract more curious customers, and increase the merchant's prestige.

Xenopi venturing into the Radiant Empire jurisdiction have a vague legal status—killing a speaking entity would be certainly improper, even more mistaking it for a sea food and eating it, but at the same time they are known for their very limited ability to behave properly, even at the degree expected from a culturally inferior race. The expulsion is favored way of dealing with problematic xenopi.

The Feathered People And The Furred Nuisance

Whereas xenopi might be a conundrum to kyo, purrlings are a primarily a nuisance to the Radiant Empire. They are unruly, reckless, mischievous, disrespectful, loud, have no sense of shame or respect for authority. They are what kyo culture despise made alive and running around. And to add insult to the injury they enjoy eating birds' eggs out of their nests...

And yet, while they might be epitome of uncivilized behavior for the Radiant Empire, kyo show a surprising level of tolerance for their antics. This partly caused by kyo not treating purrlings seriously, more like a speaking animal that is barely suitable for a role of a pet when well behaved, or annoying pest if it moves past certain limits. While there is no imperial law prescribing legal status of the furred nuisances, they are generally treated as pets or wards of their companions, who take responsibility for the purrling's antics and any injuries caused and are denied legal personality of their own. Recently in some regions, it became fashionable for prestigious and wealthy kyo to keep a few purrlings, as mascots, and amusement. This fad might last until purrlings strain the kyo patience or become replaced by a new, more exotic pet.

Purrlings living among kyo love to mimic (imperfectly and without understanding of nuances of the etiquette) the kyo behavior while spurring a ridiculous claims to fictional ranks and titles that would be blasphemous for any proper kyo citizen. Many purrlings that entered into contact with kyo even for a short time are impressed with kyo vanity and behavior and are inspired into a new levels of mock-behavior of their own, occasionally trying to recreate kyo society and hierarchy among fellow purrlings, until they got bored or distracted by some new experience.

Fantasy Races: Rivalries And Alliances, Part 1

What happens when fantasy races (well, technically species, but certain system popularized term "race" when referring to humanoid or at least playable creatures that it became a game mechanic term so I stick to it here) contact each other... How do their distinct biology, culture, philosophy, and behavior interact and what can result in such meeting?

The Haughty And The Vain

"The only megalomania I can stand in my presence is my own."

Azan and kyo are arrogant, believing in their respective superiority over other sapient peoples. For azan, their pride is feed by their magical and technological mastery, for kyo, it is derived from their religion and extent of their mercantile empire. For both, their pride shaped their language, culture, and philosophy.

When two cultures with so deeply ingrained sense of superiority meet a clash seems inevitable. Thankfully, both races disdain direct confrontation, preferring convoluted schemes, economic and diplomatic pressure, and use of hired, enslaved, conjured, bred, or constructed minions. This sometimes leads to political or economic intrigues and conflicts being played via proxy polities, often oblivious to the true reasons of the struggle. Another factor diminishing the degree of animosity between azan and kyo is their social structure: azan lack any large scale unity except for academically-bent colleges and economically-focused corporations, while kyo, formally being united via the Radiant Empire suffer from political divisions between regional governors. Neither race desires extensive territorial expansion: azan are too low in numbers due to their slow reproduction rate while kyo are very deliberate and careful in their expansion to avoid over-extension. 

With all that factors considered, the usual interaction between azan and kyo is surprisingly smooth, with both sides having acquired a degree of respect for the other race field of expertise. In fact, some azani directors and kyo governors reached an unspoken agreement of treating their competition for resources and influence as a game of sorts, trying to outmaneuver the opponent, possibly sacrificing lesser beings in the process but avoiding escalating the conflict into a direct one.

The Scientists And Philosophers

"Kai-tang are surprisingly smart for a species with such ridiculous amount of hair."

For two races with strong intellectual focus azan and kai-tang have some similarities and even more differences. While azan favor applied sciences and utilitarian philosophies, kai-tang prefer wider erudition and speculative philosophy. Both races use a voluntary groups composed of a few individuals as a primary social unit, tied by shared interests, profession, or intellectual pursuits. Self-centered azan usually view their cabals as a pragmatic way of organization for purposes of gaining tangible benefits with emotional relations and spiritual aspects downplayed. Kai-tang associations on the other hand are considered important part of one's spiritual development. Violence is rarely the first solution that either race uses to solve their problems—azan being too pragmatic to risk their life needlessly while kai-tang being too philosophically minded to react with immediate aggression. Both races can be terrifying when roused to battle, though, trying to annihilate grave threats—azan using their magic, technology, and minions, and kai-tang combining physical prowess and magic.

Both races tend to live in small communities and isolated groups, minimizing chance for organized conflict. When azan and kai-tang come into blows, it is limited struggle, almost universally caused by dispute over a noteworthy resource, and often takes form of one of more ruthless azani corporations harassing kai-tang settlement through intermediaries, "rogue" monsters, arranged accidents, and an occasional catastrophe until they leave or agree to sell the resource.

Occasionally an azani cabal or even a corporation hires a kai-tang or an association of them as skilled labor force or even as low-tier assistants and overseers for less intellectually-capable laborers. From time to time, more academically minded azan or even whole colleges recognize intellectual achievements of kai-tang scholars and sages, entering into scholarly correspondence to exchange ideas. Larger kai-tang communities might commission azani engineer when they decide that technological solution to an existing problem is the most appropriate.

The Pattern-makers and the Pattern-seekers

"I looked and I saw. The movement. The dozens teethed wheels interlocking with smaller and bigger teethed wheels. Things with shapes that have no names revolving around each other. Lights circling lights like if they were stars. Metal, stone, crystal, and smoke. It was enthralling, it was terrible."

Azan and oc'cli are in many ways oppositions. Azan have an intense sense of intellectual superiority that makes them seek mastery over the world, bending their environment to their needs, and believing themselves to be the source of order. For them "natural" is a derogatory term, synonym of inefficient, base, chaotic, product of random processes, and in dire need of being improvement or discarded to make place for deliberate creation. Oc'cli are seeking harmony and intuitive enlightenment, trying to discover and understand the ultimate pattern of things, which they believe is inherent in all things, but especially in the nature.

When azan care to pay attention to oc'cli at all, they disdain their focus on intuition and mock their intellectual slowness—and more than one azan hypothesized that oc'cli might be result of someone's failed experiment to create dedicated savant-minions. Oc'cli on the other hand have troubles with incorporating azan advanced technology into their interpretations of the ultimate pattern. Some of them are easily fascinated and confounded by complexity of azan creations. A few creeds declared azan creations to be disruptions to the pattern itself, especially in regions where azan were particularly rapacious at exploiting local resources, creating a number of oc'cli guerrilla groups targeting azan installations wherever they can find them.

Mountain Terrors!

It is time to announce the first non-Pathfinder publication I am part of!

Green Ronin Publishing (for whom I wrote a moss lich template for their Advanced Bestiary Pathfinder update), currently releases a series of environment themed monsters: Mountain Terrors! Watch out for mountain trolls and devouring shadows! They wait to stalk you down and eat alive... Or dead if you will struggle too much!

Those of you who prefer DrivethruRPG can get it there as well.