My Fantasy RPG World, Feedback and Ideas appreciated

I have a lot of trouble making up my mind about this! But it is pretty easy to arrange my map into a cylinder.

I sketched out my map of Scarterra by hand on a standard 8.5 x 11 inch piece of printing paper. 93.5 square inches. That means it's about 78% as wide as it is long.

The surface area of Earth is about 196.9 million square miles. The Circumferance of the Earth is 24,901 miles. I would prefer Scarterra not get bigger than this. If I made the circumference of Scarterra 22,000 (because it's easily divisible by 11) than one inch is 2000 miles. Scarterras would be 17,160 miles north to south for a surface area of 377,520,000 square miles (a sphere is a lot more effecient in generating surface area than the a cylinder with the top and bottom cut out). That's still more than the surface area of Mars.

If I made an inch represent 1000 miles, the we have a 11,000 by 8,580 for 94,380,000 square miles, just shy of double Mar's surface area.

If I made an inch represent 500 miles (which is close to what I had in mind before I started drawing). The world would be 5,500 by 4,250 for 23,375,000 square miles which is about half as much as Mars. That's about as small as I'm willing to go. That may seem small but it's based on those numbers that I used along with this medieval demographics tool. Basic envelope map figures that Scarterra has about 150 million sapient life forms in civilized lands and about 50 million barbarians and intelligent monsters on land. That is plenty of people to have thousands of adventures and stories with. I'm going to run with this as the planet size until and unless someone comes up with a compelling reason to make the planet bigger.

Scaraqua has no real world history or science to pull up logical medieval demographics from because we have nothing like it in the real world. On one hand, an aquatic person would probably require more space to produce or find enough food than a land person. On the other hand, the ocean has more space because, at least in theory they have three dimensional space to live and work in.

Without anything to base this on, I figure Scaraqua would have 33% to 66% of Scarterra's population and have about a roughly equal proportion of agrarian versus nomads. I have even less idea for how big Scarsubterra should be, but the underground biome will certainly be the smallest subdivision of my setting, probably 10-25% of Scarterra's population. I'm not even 100% sure I want to make Scarsubterra a separate realm. One thing at a time.



I did not measure this but my goal when I sketched Scarterras was to have more land than Earth. Roughly 50-60% water as opposed ot the 71% water that we enjoy on Earth. I guess if sketched Scarterras on a CAD or some similar program I'm too lazy to work with, I could find out exactly what the land-to-water ratio is.

 

Magic trumps science in Scarterra. At least with regards to geographical features.

Prepare for a very long answer!

Turoch created Scarterra version 1.0

Turoch basically was a farmer, so he created a world that was simple and peaceful (for the same reason that ranchers keep cows in simple and peaceful pens. The land mass was a giant pangea like continent with a big fresh water lake in the middle (where Mera's Lake is now). The lake was elevated so that a bunch of rivers flowed from it. The ocean around the pangea continent was fresh and drinkable.

Scarterra 1.1 occurred after Turoch died. The chaos of the fighting caused a few hills and valleys and a few deserts but the biggest change was that Turoch's death salted the ocean.

Scarterra 1.2 to 1.9 didn't really have any major events but the Nine added a few features to help the ancient dragons and other mortal races to be more comfortable. Later the Nine would make small changes to natural features to help the elves and humans The dragons terraformed the world a bit too as they got more powerful. Later elf and humans became powerful enough to do mild terraforming themselves. Korus also added forests and stuff to add biodiversity because Korus is all about creating interesting environments the way a painter works with canvas.

Scarterra 2.0 occurred when a dragon Queen tried a massive magical ritual to harness the elemental core of the planet. The Pangea continent split into several smaller landmasses. The northern portion formed Colassia and the southern portion formed Penarchia, Khemarok, and Umera. But the Chaos wasn't done. Elementals show up in the aftermath of magic events, usually surviving alone or in small groups and lasting anywhere from ten minutes to a couple weeks. After this mess, millions of elements were summoned at once, and they lingered at least ten years.

Earth elementals had the most lasting effect. The earth elementals were also the most regimented and tightly clustered. If thousands of earth elementals march or rampage in a straight line they are going to create a mountain range as a byproduct of them just being earth elementals (they swim in the earth to move). They also created new islands. The earth elementals actions vaguely ressemble real world plate tectonics.

The other elementals had fewer permanent effects. If fire elementals burn a bunch of stuff, sure it sucks for the people living in the burned areas but those areas are usually going to fully recover over say 10,000 years. A few places where fire elementals really went to town did leave some permanent effects. A few dry arid deserts mark these spots.

Water elementals had the second biggest effect after earth elementals. They created new lakes, rivers, springs, and reservoirs above and below ground. They skirmished with earth elementals on every coast line and the ebb and flow of these elemental fights is carried on to this day through the tides (edit: that's why I was reluctantly to tie the moon to the tides). They also indirectly influenced the creation of new islands. Lunatus marks the spot where earth elementals and water elementals fought most fiercely.

The air elementals had very few permanent effects, but most Scarterrans assume perpetually windy areas bear their mark.

Hybrid spots are the rarest but most interesting features.
Fire and Earth: Volcanoes
Fire and Water: Geysers and hot springs
Fire and Air: The Fire Plains are a rugged region where fire sometimes rains from the sky. Rarest hybrid feature
Water and Air: Areas where it never stops raining
Water and Earth: Underground rivers, acquifers, wells. By far the most common hybrid feature.
Earth and Air: Floating islands. Most of these have since fallen back to earth creating mountains and rock cliffs in weird places.

So that's Scarterra 2.0

Scarterra 3.0 was a smaller patch, metaphorically speaking. An elven king tried a ritual to make himself a god. It didn't work and he accidentally unleashed millions of Void Demons which went on a massive killing spree.

The Void Demons mostly attacked living creatures and looked for souls to eat rather than reshaping the landscape though the reason East and West Colassia is not a single continent is because a bunch of powerful wizards magially struck down the strongest demon lord there and the force was so strong the continent split. That's why the narrow strip of water is called the Demon Strait. Though all three elven nations prefer Name of Most Powerful Elven Wizard Strait. The Dark Elves, Wood Elves, and Grey Elves all claim that that wizard was one of their ancestors and the other two nations are lying.

A small number of places with intense demon activity, such as places where mortal and demon armies had bloody stalemates permanently became near infertile and lifestyle. The Desert of Tears (haven't decided which continent to put that on) is going to be biggest such place. The Demon Lords mostly damaged the soul of the world, rather than the body of the world.

The Harbinger was the first Demon Lord to emerge. It destroyed the most powerful nation of the time and then was brought down at the Demon Strait.

The Corruptor tried to recruit mortal spies and agents. The Corruptor had a big impact on cultures but didn't alter the landscape much.

The Extinguisher didn't just want to chase down mortals but had the idea of blighting their crops and food supplies. A few blighted areas mark areas where the Extinguish tried to...well extinguish life itself, but later the Extinguisher decided it would be more efficient to block out the sun and kill all plant life. Unfortunately for the Extinguisher, this ritual required the demon army to stay in one place a long time, allowing mortals to plan a decisive counterattack. The Extinguisher was arguably the least effective Demon Lord.

The Vandal didn't focus on wracking up a big soul count. The Vandal wanted to make sure civilization woudl never flourish again. The Vandal demolished buildings and destroyed libraries whenever possible. The Vandal's legacy is literally nothing.

The Defiler set fire to lush forests and tried to taint the land irreprably. The Defiler had a relatively short reign of terror as all the nature affiliated creatures united against this Demon Lord.

Most Demon Lords sent there armies to the largest concentration of mortal souls they could find, greedy for souls. This usually meant elves or goblins were the prime target. The Annihalator didn't want to leave a job half-finished. The Annihalator specifically targeted the less populous races with the goal of driving them to total extinction.

The Successor was said to try to become the new Turoch. Turoch once ran all of Scarterra as a soul farm. The Successor built massive prisons to force elves and especially goblins into forced breeding ot harvest their souls like farm animals. Each of the Successor's prison cities were demolished brick by brick, but these sites are foever haunted. The very stones are said to weep at night here.

When the mortals began to raise armies to fight the Void Demons, most demon lords were full of hubris. "Oh, the mortals are fighting back, how adorable!" and they steered their armies to fight the mortal's armies with no hesitation. No so, the Ravager. The Ravager deliberately sought out mortals where they were the weakest and most vulnerable very opportunistically picking the lord's targets. The Ravager was the last demon lord to fall.

Or was it the last Demon Lord to fall! Some scholars believe that each of the Demon Lords was created to destroy the legacy of one of the gods who rebelled against Turoch. There are nine deities on Scarterras. There were eight Demon Lords.


I have yet to adapt the demon lords to Scaraqua, but Demons do not have to breathe and all of them can swim. Assuming I don't rewrite my demon lore to make one or more Demon Lords specialize in Scaraqua, the Ravager, Annihalator, Corrupter, and the Vandal were probably highly interested in the Sea and the other four probably paid little attention to the Scaraqua.

So first Turoch shaped the world
Then the Nine tweaked the world
The the dragons tweaked the world
Then elementals REALLY went to town reshaping the world.
Then the Nine and elves tweaked the world
Then Demons moderately went to town reshaping the world
Then the Nine and humanity tweaked the world slightly.

My plate tectonics is based on "A wizard did it."

 

As far as mortals know, Void Demons don't have names. These titles were given to the Demon Lords by thier enemies. I might slip up from time to time but Void Demons don't have sex or gender. I try to avoid pronouns or default to "it."

That is what I'm going for with the mythology.

The Eight Demon Lords are well known at least to scholarly type people. Historians bicker and argue about which Demon Lords wrecked which places, but the basic concepts are largely agreed on. There is also a lot of storytellers liscense. Everyone from lowly goblins to mighty human kings likes to say that their direct ancestor was a legendary hero who killed a Demon Lord.

Realistically embellishment and historical revisionism would cause historians and storytellers to lose all the details. From my omnscient point of view, if I leave the details later I could write a historical novel or a Unmaking setting RPG. I am mildly concerned that such a story would be a little on the boring side. I think a more interesting story would be a small scale group of people trying to survive ala Walking Dead (a show I might have watched twenty minutes of).

An immortal historian is a great idea. Sadly I do not have one.

Since I am one of the few people who subscribed to DC Universe, occasionally I binge read comic PDFs. I really liked the Atlantean Chronicles which covers the major events of Atlantis from the point it sank beneath the waves until the present. There is a joke/fear in Atlantis that the job of Royal Chronicler is jinxed. The narrator dies a lot and is replaced by a new character, usually the previous chronicler's son, daughter, niece or nephew, and the "voice" of the narrator changed each time. The whole way through there are comic panels that demonstrate the occasional disconnect between reality and the historian's bias. In one case, the king told the chronicler to leave out rumors of the king's affairs. "I'm okay with you criticizing me, but not these baseless accusations!" Spoiler, it turns out, the rumors were not baseless.

I am not sure if that narrative style would work outside of a comic book format, but I like the idea of writing history in two fonts. One font shows what the chronicler writes down, the other font shows what is actually happening. Of course everytime the chronicler dies and is replaced, his or her font would change. I'm not sure if I want to use that format for The History of Scarterra, but I think it would be a good format for The History of Meckelorn.

I'm still pondering the details of spirits. Spirits can die, but they do age. There could be several spirits with thousands of years of history. There are a few issues. First, the Nine may order their spirit minions to not share certain details or even to lie. Second, spirits might choose lies or omissions. Third, since spirits are born of the essence of one of the Nine, any history you get is going to be extremely slanted towards that god or goddesses worldview. Khemra is the only of the Nine that even pretends to be impartial with historical accounts. It would be noted that Khemra spirit historical accounts are likely to be boring and dry.

After the battle 1,732 elves, 413 goblins, 2 dragons, and 4 scale giants were dead or missing. Based on the salt deposits, roughly 500 Void Demons were destroyed.

Between the First Umaking, the Second Unmaking, and assorted book burners in the Second Age, any written account from the First Age is rare and highly prized. Dragons and the surviving thurakel races have oral histories about the First Age. Generally how great their ancestors were.

The elven nations were wrecked in the Second Making, and the minions of The Vandal, burned a lot of books. Lunatus used to be one of the smallest and least important elven kingdoms, but due to the fact that they were an island on the equator with a small population. They were the last priority target for most Demon Lords. They had to fight back a several invasions, but no Demon Lord ever set foot on the island. They have the most complete records from the Second Age, but the Wood Elves and Dark Elves claim these records were written by weaklings and fools, so their accounts shouldn't be trusted.

Also, for a very brief period of time, the Crown Prince of Lunatus was an infernalist in league with the Void Demons, he might have wrecked or altered some historical records. I haven't figured out exactly what he did as an infernalist. The main reason I wrote in that the Crown Prince was an infernalist was it seemed like a good idea for Lunatus to dispense with primogeniture inheritance (first born inheritance). Instead, the emperor or empress' favorite son or daughter inherits the throne which leads to much boot licking, slanderous campaigns and fratricides, but so far, zero infernalists. That's a qualified success!

To finally answer your question: So I guess most Scarterrans and most Scaraquans have to deal with historical accounts that are full of errors and biases with a dash of lies and propaganda.

Often when I cover the history of an intelligent race, I like to cover what they say their history is and what their enemies say their history is. In this case, the average Scarterran is going to be better educated than the average real world medieval peasant. Khemra's priests and spirits push for knowledge of history and general literacy. Zarthus priests and spirit support large bardic traditions. The other deities don't push this stuff as much, but they dip their toes in the water, if only to make sure to counteract their rivals obvious exaggerations and lies.

For instance, Beholders. Eye Monsters. Eye Monsters isn't trademarked. They are an original creation of mine, like the Pretty Good Antlered Rodent. Any similariites to the Great Horned Rat are purely coincidental...

Be-Eye Monsters say that the first Be-Eye Monsters rose out of the eye sockets of Turoch's eye after his death. Thus they are true heirs to his power and are akin to gods..

Many subteranean races say Be-Eye Monsters were literally born from the nightmares of the Nine. Thus, they are abominations that must die.

Many dragons claim that dragon sorcerers created the first Be-Eye Monsters. Thus, Be-Eye Monsters should serve their draconic betters rather than cling to their delusions of grandeur.

 

Haha, same here.

 

I was probably the only person who was disappointed when Mini-Pringle cans became 30% bigger at no additional costs. The prexisting mini-cans were perfect for Skink huts. I only had two saved up when they were discontinued. I know I can cut a pringles can but they are a pain to cut cleanly.

 

I wrote a big rambling brainstorming document about fantasy sea creatures, but I'll break it down in smaller easier chunks.

Sponge People

I pondered this a while. Initially I was opposed to this. Remember the Myconids? They are interesting for their unique biology but given that they don’t consume resources and have very little worth stealing, they are not going to get in conflict with other races or each other.

Sponges are filter feeders, so Sponge People don’t need to farm. Their flesh is poisonous to most carnivores so they don’t need many weapons. They are just there. I was going to throw that out. Sapient people in a post-scarcity situation aren’t that interesting except as a character study.

Then I thought about the Second Unmaking. Sponge People don’t have anything other mortal Scaraquans want to steal, but they would still have souls Even if Sponge People were not immobile, they wouldn’t be fast. After a hundred generations of never facing a credible threat, in the face of a horde of Void Demons, they would be annihilated.

Going back to the primordial horrors thing. What if some of them returned in some twisted infernal or undead form? The undersea pineapples where they once dwelled are now haunted. Passive undead are less scary than undead that chase you, but it makes sense that since living sponges are filter feeders that their undead remnants would also be filter feeders. A cave that just kills everyone who swims in it is deadly but doesn’t make particularly interesting stories. It’s just a ganky way to kill someone. But a cave that causes visitors to hallucinate their worst fears and biggest regrets: that’s awesome story potential. Some excellent horror movies don’t have a specific monster or ghost as the villain, the location is the antagonist. Event Horizon comes to mind, a cult classic that was underappreciated in its time.

But there has to be some reason a sane person would go into a place haunted by Sponge induced nightmare hallucinations. Is there any positive remnants of the Sponge People left that someone can quest for?


Merfolk

Merfolk are iconic to underwater fantasy, they are in the public domain, and they have “Mer” in the name, so let’s include them and make them children of Mera. It’s not really important if they were created before or after the humans they superficially resemble. Either way, the Merfolk are going to claim that they are the elder race and humans were created as a knockoff of them, not the other way around.

At some point I’ll need to come up with some cultural mores and idioms that clash significantly with human norms, but on the whole, merfolk are probably going to be the most human of all Scaraquans. Besides a relatively human appearance, they’ll probably have agriculture, horses (hippocampi), live in some sort of houses, use medieval-esque weapons and tools, and have a vaguely feudalistic government.

While they are going to mostly be loyal to their creator Mera, I want to give them more bite. They are not going to be hippies. I’m thinking of making them more passionate than humans. A kind of “We are lovers of peace but do not shirk from war” attitude. When they are happy, they are really happy. When they are angry, they are really angry. That’s a good way to differentiate them from humans but make them fairly easy to understand.

I’m not sure if I want to give some/most/all merfolk the ability to temporalily trade their fins and gills for legs and lungs. Assuming they have access to the same basic magic system I designed for Scarterrans applies to Scaraquans (and that’s an assumption I am going to make if only out of pragmatism).

Merfolk with Augmentation ●●● (divine magic) or Transmutation ●● (arcane magic) could magically walk and breathe and land with no difficulty. Their legs would probably be covered in scales and their gills would still show. They need a lot stronger magic if they want to masquerade as ordinary humans. Likewise, surface dwelling humans could use that same magic to survive and move underwater.

Since most humans are the Mario and merfolk are basically human, they wouldn’t have many extreme strengths and weaknesses. If they could take human form or otherwise walk on land as an innate ability that is a huge advantage. I could do something like they did in the latest Aquaman movie. Highborn Atlanteans can breathe air, but commoners cannot. I wasn’t a huge fan of that in the movie, but it doesn’t bother me for Scaraqua. I could make the ability to “swim on land” a rare ability not necessarily tied to social class or blood line. In game terms, it would be a Merit. I do like the idea of merfolk being able to survive on the surface when it’s raining. I know it’s not very scientific but it makes sense metaphysically speaking.

There is another question I’ll pose for the readers of this thread. Should merfolk be pretty much identical to humans statwise or should they be naturally stronger and tougher than surface humans? This goes to Aquaman comics. The idea that just surviving the pressure in the lower depths of the sea would via sci-fiction logic mean that sea dwelling humans would have thicker skin than humans. The fact that water provides more resistance to movement than air means that just moving around would make the average merfolk stronger than the average human. Or not. Since merfolk are basically magic creatures they could be exactly as strong as a human of their size and build. Just for game balance.

Even if I don’t make them stronger for sci-fi reasons, I am going to make merfolk better able to handle the cold than humans and somewhat more susceptible to extreme heat. In this case, I’m talking weather and climate, not magical heat or cold based attacks. Along those lines, unless they are wearing armor for battle, it is unlikely merfolk would have much use for clothing. They would wear the bare minimum that modesty requires. If for some reason I can sell Scaraqua to HBO merfolk can swim around with less than that.

 

My initial thought was to make the Sponge People morally superior like the Federation. Because they are lived in a post-scarcity society, they were considered non-threatening to the other aquatic peoples. They were considered impartial arbiters to turn to during disputes. Also, this impartiality might make them accurate chroniclers. If any history buffs wanted to get reasonably accurate and detailed accounts of Scaraqua before the Second Unmaking, their best resource would be surviving Sponge People archives.

But the the thought of dark and evil Sponges has some appeal. I will revisit this later. But the Muse of World Building demanded that I develop Sharkmen...in great detail.

 

Sharkmen is too literal. In little Mermaid the shark men were called Sharkanians. Under the RPG Werewolf: the Apocalypse, the weresharks were called Rokea. I think Rokea might be a reference to Polynesian legend about shark men but now the top page of the google search is entirely filled with WtA references.

When I decide to come up ScalenexTM names for my homebrew fantasy creatures, I think the best place to go for inspiration is real world linguistics.

English: Shark
Latin: Pistrus
Greek: karcharías
Japanese: Same (holy is “Seinaru”, I’m going to bastardize “Samearu” to mean “shark priest”
Mandarin: Shāyú
Spanish: Tiburón
French: Requin
Welsh: siarc
German: Haifisch

The number one goal is to pick a name that sounds cool. That being said, all else equal, when I think Undersea fantasy settings, I think “Atlantis.” When I think “Atlantis” I think of the Ancient Greeks. So I am biased towards karcharías. My Sharkmen are going to fill a similar story niche to orcs. “Orc” is elegant its simplicity, but I always thought Tolkien’s “Urak Hai” was a cool name. German for shark is “der Haifish”. From now on, my Sharkmen will hence forth be called "Karakhai".

Karakhai Religion and Philosophy

Karakhai are going to be the children of Maylar. Maylar created sharks to be the ultimate predator and later he created Karakhai to be the ultimate shark. Most Karakhai worship Maylar as their patron and parent. I haven’t figured out if the Karakhai see Maylar as a mother figure or father figure. Either way they whole heartedly accept Maylar’s credo that “Might makes Right.” Where Karakhai get into disagreement is what is the best fate for “the Weak”? Should the weak be slaves, food, or simply ignored? That’s the closest thing Karakhai have to theological debate.

Most Karakhai will acknowledge the other deities besides Maylar but priests or theurgists not associated with Maylar are very rare. Some Karakhai pay the other deities no heed. A few hardliners show open contempt to all deities who are not Maylar or just to Mera.

Karakhai view sharks as holy. They will not harm a shark unless their lives are directly threatened. Karakhai do not keep pets, but they usually let sharks enter and leave their camps feely. Assuming food is relatively plentiful, they are likely to feed any sharks that visit. Sharks will generally only attack Karakhai in truly desperate situations. In many cases, sharks provide an extra layer of defense to their camp as the sharks often spot intruders before the Karakhai do. If hunting is scarce, Karakhai will drive sharks away from their camps because they do not want to compete with sharks for prey, but killing sharks is generally considered sacrilege.

Karakhai priests or priestesses of Maylar are called Samearu. About three out four Samearu are male. Most Samearu are generally celibate and Samearu generally live outside of the tribes. Karakhai are generally not materialistic, but Samearu tend to take to this an extreme. The shark equivalent of the bare foot hermit dressed in rags.

Secular Karakhai are usually pragmatic enough to trade for or steal weapons and tools from Scaraquans that are better craftsmen than they. Most Samearu eshew the use of weapons or armor not crafted by anyone other than themselves so their weapons and tools tend to be pretty crude, though Samearu on average are much better at crafting things than the average Karakhai. A Karakhai tribe that doesn’t have access to tools and weapons crafted by more nimble-fingered Scaraquans are likely to have a Samearu crafter swimming among them.

Samearu are free to swim among any tribe, even between bitter rivals. It is considered bad luck for a Karakhai to harm a Samearu though this rule does not apply to the Samearu themselves. Major disputes between Samearu are settled by ritualized combat. Most Samearu specialize in magical lore of Animals and they commonly use this power to summon and command large numbers of ordinary sharks to do their bidding.

Most sharks do not have gill flaps, so if they stop swimming, they suffocate. Karakhai do have gill flaps and like most Scaraquans, they have to sleep sometimes. That said, they are not great at standing still, literally or figuratively. Forward motion is the Karakhai’s philosophical credo. Risk taking is encouraged. Stagnation is despised. A Karakhai that is actually bound or imprisoned will literally start to die. If a non-Karakhai defeats a Karakhai in fair combat, other Karakhai will rarely hold a grudge, but a non-Karakhai that kills a Karakhai by imprisoning her can expect to make an enemy of the entire Karakhai race. It’s like shaving a dwarves beard, and then suffocating the dwarf with his beard hair.

Their main credos are. “Might makes right,” “New is better than old.” “Boldness is better than caution.” "Change is good." Karakhai sum all their attitudes together under the credo "Always swim forward."


Sex and Gender Roles among the Karakhai

Real world sharks, females tend to be noticeably bigger than males. Females tend to have significantly thicker skin than males. Therefore it seems logical that Karakhai females would be a bit bigger and stronger and more thick-skinned than males on average. Based on this, Karakhai are going to be matriarchal. About three out of four tribal chieftains are female. In general females are given deference.

Each tribe is different. In some tribes females are the predominant warriors because they are bigger and stronger. In these tribes males still fight, but they take care of almost all of the non-martial chores. In other tribes, males are the predominant warriors because they are more expendable. In these tribes the females still fight, but they take care of nearly all the non-martial chores. Whatever the tribes overall attitude towards sex roles is, the chieftain is always expected to be at the forefront of war regardless if the chieftain is male or female.

Karakhai are not monogamous. Mating is relatively rare, occurring once every three years for a brief window. During this period, it’s not uncommon for Karakhai to have several partners. Karakhai females usually pick their mates and Karakhai females value strong males. A very accomplished male warrior could find himself with as many as a dozen mates in a single mating season. Karkhai courtship and mating is very violent and utterly terrifying to outsiders who witness it. There are lots of “love bites” on both partners.

The period leading up to the mating season is very dangerous for the rest of Scaraquans. Karakhai tribes that normally avoid each other meet up more often since mating between tribes is encouraged to diversity the genepool and avoid stagnation. Karakhai are also more aggressive towards outsiders in the months leading up to the mating season, especially males who want to be able to impress females with their martial exploits.

Karakhai, like most sharks, give live birth. Karakhai females give birth to one (50%), two (40%) or three (10%) pups. Because Karakhai all mate at the roughly the same time, females give birth at roughly the same time. Pups are considered children of the entire tribe. Every Karakhai is considered a brother or sister of the Karakhai born during its birthing season. It is frowned on for a mother or father to show favoritism to their own offspring (and the nature of their mating makes establishing paternity difficult anyway). Adults will all work together to care and feed for the young though they certainly prescribe to notions of tough love. Some tribes encourage pups to fight each other savagely, others repress it. This often depends on the relatively scarcity or abundance of food.

At age ten, a Karakhai goes through a rite of passage to adulthood. This rite of passage varies from tribe to tribe but it’s always difficult and dangerous. About one in four Karakhai do not survive it. Those that survive are considered full members of the tribe. Karkahai reach sexual maturity around age fifteen. Females remain fertile till about age thirty, typically mating four or five times. Males tend to remain fertile till about age forty. Karakhai can theoretically survive past seventy, but few Karakhai are content to die in such an ignoble fashion. Once they start to show a significant decline in physical prowess around age fifty, most Karakhai will choose to die in an exciting and dangerous way. Some swim at the head of war parties. Others take on a powerful sea creature. Others swim off alone to die in private. This is called “Swimming towards Maylar.”


Karakhai Organization
Karakhai tribes typically vary between thirty and two hundred adult members. The chief’s word is law in all things and who is the chief is determined by one-on-one combat. The defending chief gets to choose weapons which is usually “spear and shield” or “as a true shark” meaning both combatants are unarmed. The fight continues until one fighter dies or yields. About half the time, someone dies and about half the time someone yields. This varies from tribe to tribe. Some tribes rarely kill the loser, and some tribes rarely spare the loser.

The chief can be male or female. Three times out of four, the chief is female. The chief can be challenged at any time though certain times of the year are considered more auspicious to issue a challenge. It is considered a modest taboofor a Karakhai to issue a challenge if the chieftain is wounded or sick and likely to recover. It is a major taboo if the injury in question came from a previous challenge, but it’s not unheard of. If the chieftain is a skilled fighter who is also a fool, than he or she will face several back-to-back challenges until eventually the exhausted chief loses though defeated challengers should expect no leniency.

Some larger tribes have lieutenants to the chieftain who are below the chieftain, but above everyone else. This is rare. In general all adults below the chieftain theoretically considered equal but the words of bigger and stronger sharks are given more weight. If two Karakhai of the same social status have a disagreement they cannot talk out they will usually settle it with some kind of physical contest. A swimming race, a feat of strength contest, or nonlethal combat are all pretty common.

Outside of mating seasons, Karakhai tribes tend to either fight with each other or keep their distance. If different tribes need to interact peacefully, they will use Samearu as intermediaries. If the Samearu believe a major issue affects the Karakhai as whole, they can declare a School of Chieftains which is exactly what it sounds like. A bunch of chieftains having a meeting. It’s uncommon but sometimes a Chieftain will declare himself or herself a Grand Chieftain or Chieftain of Chieftain. At which point the other nearby chieftain either submit or fight back in a duel. It is not taboo for a would-be Grand Chieftain to face consecutive challengers. If a Grand Chieftain cannot fight at least two or three consecutive challengers, she is not worthy of the title. Thus Grand Chieftains are rare, unless it’s the Grand Chieftain of two or three tribes.

When six or more tribes unite under a single Chieftain of Chieftain, all of Scaraqua trembles in fear…


Karakhai Magical Traditions
On average one in a hundred Karakhai are Samearu. Samearu must have at least one dot worth of divine magic to qualify for the title. The most popular spheres are Animal Power, Augmentation, Wrath, and Healing. No divine sphere is considered forbidden or discouraged, so Samearu may be found wielding all sorts of magic. As Maylar casters, Samearu get a -1 castint difficulty bonus for Animal, Hexing, and Wrath.

\Samearu are theurgists, not favored souls. They train new members in one-on-one apprenticeships. Any Karakhai that wants to join thier ranks is free to ask a Sameraru to be his or her mentor, but they need to pass the demanding tests the Samearu puts before them.

Fewer than one in a thousand Karakhai are favored souls. About half of the favored souls are favored souls of Maylar and the other half are favored souls of another deity. The latter of which are almost certainly outcasts or mavericks of Karakhai society. Even favored souls of Maylar often don't fit in well with other Karakhai. They are usually more focused on Maylar's global goals rather than focused on aiding the Karakhai as a race.

Karakhai are rarely sorcerers or sorceresses. Maybe one in five hundred of them are born with the ability. Sorcerers are generally treated with respect, but they cannot be Samearu or chieftains. Karakhai sorcerers usually tend to favor the schools of Transmutation and Invocation. Diviners and Illusionists are are. Karakhai Sorcerers with Enchantment or Conjuration magic are practically unheard of.

Maybe one or two tribes have Karakhai wizards if the tribes have unusually cordial relations with magic savvy Scaraquans of other races. Most Karakhai wizards studied under Squidmen mentors. Karakhai wizards’ specialties are flipped from sorcerers. Illusionists, Conjurers, and Enchanters are common. Invokers and Transmuters are rare.


Karakhai Outsider Relations
Since I have only developed a very bare bones assessment of Merfolk and the other Scaraquans aren’t even named, I cannot really go into details here. Suffice to say, Karakhai will frequently assault or demand tribute from other Scaraquans, but they are not mindless killers and savages. Karakhai are sapient beings that are capable of suppressing their murderous urges.

Karakhai can be reasoned and negotiated with. Some tribes can established decades long peace with the more civilized Scaraquans. This behavior will rarely win the Karakhai friends among the more traditional minded Karakhai tribes, but since the peaceful tribes often have profitable trading deals, the peaceful tribes are often wielding the best weapons and armor, so they can win most skirmishes with other tribes assuming they aren’t grossly outnumbered.

Karakhai Game Mechanics

Attributes: Karakhai have the same 1-5 spread on all nine attributes like most humanoids get.

Shark Strength: Karakhai get a -1 difficulty bonus on non-magical Strength rolls

Shark Endurance: Karakhai get a -1 difficulty bonus on all non-magical Stamina rolls apart from soak rolls. Karkhai sleep less than most humanoids, typically being fine with four hours of sleep per day.

Shark Skin: Karakhai have thick skin and males get two soak dice against lethal damage. Females get three soak dice. These extra soak dice stack with their Stamina for resisting bashing damage.

Shark Senses: Karakhai have wide peripheral vision, an excellent sense of smell, as well as electrical and lateral senses. Karakhai get a -2 difficulty break on all non-magical Alertness rolls in the water. Karakhai still enjoy a -1 bonus outside of the water.

Shark Bite: Karakhai bites inflict Strength +2 lethal damage. The difficulty to hit is 7 for land combat, 6 for sea combat, and 4 if the target is engaged in a grapple first. You do not want to let a Karakhai grapple you.

Electrical Discharge: Karakhai can not only receive electrical impulses but they can send electrical impulses to communicate with other Karakhai and to a lesser extent sharks and shark-like monsters. Range is roughly 500 yards in the water or a 100 yards outside the water. Messages have to be fairly simple. “Attack now!” works, but “Take the third detachment and swim around the barricade to hit the left flank of the merfolk pikemen!” is not something that can be relayed.

A non-Karakhai with a very high Perception + Alertness dice pool might be able to tell when two or more Karakhai nearby are conversing via electrical discharges, but there is no way a non-Karakhai can eavesdrop on the conversation without magic. It’s rare to find a Karakhai with a silver tongue, but the few Karakhai that regularly negotiate civilly with other Scaraquans are usually clever enough to use their secret electrical communication to their advantage.

This power can also help Karakhai who are magically invisible or simply swimming in the dark coordinate efforts. It is almost impossible for a Karakhai to accidentally hit an ally with friendly fire no matter how bad visibility gets.



Shark Appearance: Appearance can represent two things. Appearance can represent how attractive a character is to potential mates of the same species, or it can represent how impressive and scary a monster is to those outside the species. It just so happens that Karakhai males and females alike find scary looking Karakhai sexy. So a Karakhai with a high Appearance is both terrifying to most humans and Merfolk appealing to Karakhai of the opposite sex.



Shark Belligerence: Karakhai get a +1 difficulty penalty on all non-magical Charisma and Manipulation rolls with non-Karakhai, unless the roll is related to intimidation.

Stubby Fingers: Karakhai get a +1 difficulty penalty on any rolls involving fine motor skills. Thus you don’t see a lot of master craftsmen among Karakhai.

Always Forward: Karakhai get edgy if they have to metaphorically or figuratively stay in one place. When a Karakhai is feeling moderately constrained, he gets a +1 difficulty penalty on all rolls until he does something exciting and different. A Karakhai limited thusly cannot regain temporary Willpower points.

A Karakhai that is literally bound or imprisoned completely takes one unsoakable level of lethal damage every day of confinement until they die or are set free.


On Land: Without magical assistance, Karakhai must hold their breath if they want to move on land. Their Stamina bonus means they are better at holding their breath than most creatures, but it’s hard to hold your breath while doing something strenuous such as fighting. A typical warrior might jump onto a ship, fight for two or three rounds, then jump back in the water (ideally pulling someone off the ship with them).

Their feet and legs are well suited to running as well as swimming. Assuming they can breathe, they suffer no Dexterity penalties outside of the water and they can run faster than most Scaraquans, roughly as fast as most humans on land.

 

Not every background element needs to be completely new and original.

The probably need two unique titles: one for "chieftain" and one for "khan"....eventually.

I did use this motiff with orcs already. Mordock the Conquerer, a half-orc who created the largest empire that Scarterra ever saw, but it crumbled after his death. The main difference between Mordock and Genghis Kahn is that Mordock was not just a brilliant general but a brilliant politician. Mordock's army included orcs, humans, giants, goblins, derro, aranea, a couple dragons, and more. Because of this, Mordock switched up his tactics and methods frequently rather than using one set of tactics (lightning raids with horse archery) over and over again. That's why Mordock was so terrifying. His army had a mix of stealthy guerilla troops, magically savvy troops, fast shock troops, and massive slow and steady infantry. He could mix and match his tactics to exploit his foes' weaknesses.

A Karkahai conquerer would look a lot more like a Mongolian Khan. It's not likely they would be able to ally with non-sharks on a large scale. I am not sure if using this history motiff again is a good idea or a bad idea. In any event I shouldn't start writing major historical events until I know what the other Scaraquan races look like.

Scaraqua will definitely have most if not all of the same sharks that we have in Earth's oceans. I still have yet to decide if Karakhai are going to come in different subspecies of Karakhai or not. I am leaning towards "no," but that's not set in stone. I still think hammerhead is the best template to design a sapient race around.

Let us pull out my Rokea book and see what they have to recommend for customizing weresharks by species.

Great White sharks are big. At a certain point, intelligent races are disadvantaged by being too big. I believe they may have the best sense of smell of the shark species, but I think hammerheads may be the #2 or #3 shark.

Tiger sharks have the best electrical senses, but again I think hammerheads hold the #2 or #3 spot. Tiger Sharks also have insanely efficient digestion systems. They are like the billy goats/garbage disposals of the sea. Their teeth can break turtle shells.

Thresher sharks have a cool ability for catching small fish, but it wouldn't do more than mildly irritate a merfolk or other large enemy.

Mako are the fastest shark, at least when sprinting. They are among the fastest fish in the sea. That's nice, but not 100% necessary for a race with human intelligence.

Blue sharks are a good jack of all trades shark. They are more aggressive than most, but they sometimes swim in schools If I wanted to use a baseline other than hammerhead, this would be what I choose.

Bull sharks can survive in fresh and salt water with equal ease. That's useful I guess. I still need to figure out how well Scaraquans in general handle fresh water. Especially since I have Mera's Lake in the center of the world, but Mera's Lake only needs to be ten feet deep at most for Scarterrans to harvest tasty fresh water from.

Goblin sharks really have nothing in real life to make them stand out from other sharks. Because they are found near Japan and White Wolf publishing loves Japanese shinto culture, Goblin Shark Based Rokea are better at swimming through the spirit world than other Rokea.

Officially, whale sharks and nurse sharks are explicitly prohibited from being Rokea. The book doesn't even mention saw sharks or cookie cutter sharks. All four sharks are like the redheaded step children of the shark family. I do like the idea of creating a magical monster using cookie cutter sharks as a template, but they are not going to be part of the Karakhai family. They might even be enemies.

The other sharks were often mentioned in passing but not expanded on or not mentioned at all. Time to browse wikipedia.

Angel sharks. A little small, but they set up ambushes along the sea floor. Maylar doesn't have a problem with ambushes but maybe some macho hammerhead men do.

Lemon sharks don't seem to have much to distinguish themselves from other sharks apart from their unusual color. They do seem to breed more often and they are more territorial sticking to relatively limtied areas rather than swimming hundreds of miles like most other sharks. Not exciting enough to include.

Leopard sharks are a bit small and skittish to base a warrior race around. They do favor shallow water near near land. If there were Leopard shark Karakhai, they would be far more likely to interact with Scarterrans than most Karakhai. I would probably need to give the ability to breathe surface air freely for them to survive.

Dusky sharks seem like another jack of all trades though not as strong or social as blue sharks. Dusky shark's best distinguishing trait in behavior is very long migrations.

Sandbar sharks are pretty boring, but they have proportionally large fins to their body weight. That is why their species is threatened. Shark fin soup.

Porbeagles are pretty boring. They are better at handling colder waters than most other sharks. There are some biologists that claim porbeagles are the only shark to exhibit "play behavior," but other biologists dispute this.

Blacktips are a little small and skittish. A little boring. Their most interesting trait is they are impressive jumpers to grab prey on the surface of the water.

Whitetips would make made Karakhai candiates. They are threatened because they are large, slow moving, mainly swim near the surface of the water, and taste delicious to humans.

Silky sharks main claim to fame is that their teeth are designed to bring down prey by opening their mouth and using their teeth to slashing at them rather than just biting down on them. Meh.

Your list didn't seem to include the Greenland shark. Not very exciting as they are as much scavengers as predators, but they can survive in much colder waters than other sharks.

So yeah that's the sharks. I stand by my assertion that hammerheads make the best sharkmen.

In high school I wrote a sci-fiction piece about a world where the aliens that kind of looked like the creature from the Black Lagoon. There were two subspecies. One that lived in salt water (Manoans) and on land and one that lived on fresh water and land (Baldarvi). The two species fought over the land. When one side was losing, they would retreat to their own respective water type and regroup. Rinse and repeat for centuries. Their technology level was stone age.

When humans and the other aliens that made up my Similar to But Legally Distinct from Star Trek's Federation found the planet. They brought advanced technology to the Baldarvi and Manoans and told them to play nice. Eager to get the new technology, they played by the rules for a century or two until a Manoan Hitler allegory rose to power. He said Manoans should have all the land. First they herded the Baldarvi into fresh water ghettos, then they salted these ghettos to kill them all.

Later, a friend told me. "You know, salt water fish can survive in fresh water, at least for several hours. The prehistoric Baldarvi would not have been able to seek refuge in fresh water. Under your premise, Manoans would probably have wiped out the Baldarvi before the Not-Federation found them."

Oops!

Assuming I take the scientific approach. How well would Scaraquans logically be able to survive in fresh water rivers and lakes?

 

Mahr-freaking-lect!


EDIT: That's not a problem if I don't publish my work, but how about Siarc-hai?