Orim Star

Races

Dwarf
Dwarves are a short but stocky race of miners and blacksmiths from the Iron Mountains in the frozen north.  They live in cities surrounded by their mines and are famous for their crafting skills and their hording of ores and precious gems and metals.  Dwarves typically have red, blonde or black hair and males always have thick bushy beards.

Elf
Elves are a svelte and agile race of archers and druids from the Eldwood forest in the east.  Their cities are grown from the roots, boughs and branches of trees and they protect the Elder Tree at the center of their forest at all cost.  They are famed fro their archery skills and connection to nature.  Elves have long, pointed ears and either blonde, black or brown hair.

Human
Humans are the most common race in all of Orim and the most varied in culture and skill.  They can be short, tall, thin, fat or muscular and can have red, blonde, brown, black, grey or white hair.  There are three major human kingdoms and two roaming clans of barbarians throughout the west and northern regions of Orim.
-Arcadian:  Arcadians inhabit the kingdom of Arcadia, the central medieval kingdom to the west of Eldwood.  They are known for their bravado, charisma and royal blood line with a clear hierarchy of nobles and peasants.
-Gypsy:  It is said that gypsies hail from the far east and were driven out of their ands by the undead plague.  They have a bad reputation as thieves and assassins and are feared for their witchcraft.  They often settle just outside of towns in large wagon caravans and hold small events involving jugglers, fortune tellers and dancers.  For the most part they are harmless but never harm or steal from them or you may be cursed by the mark of the beast.
-Keld:  Keld are a semi migrating band of kilt wearing barbarians that live in the Highlands in the north-west.  They often raid bandit and goblin camps for goods and trade them with others.  They are known for their wild red hair and temperament.
-Imperial:  Imperials hail from the western Commonwealth Empire.  They are segregated from the rest of humankind due to a peninsula and thus their technology has progressed faster with the advent of black powder weapons and minor clockwork technology.  They are constantly at war with a pirate nation on the isle of Krakens Nest.  They are known for their firearms and unique style of dress including tricorne caps and long coats.
-Skald:  Skald are the people of Frostreach, a frozen land of mountains, forests and fjords.  They share their territory with giants and dwarves and battle trolls and serpents regularly.  They are a large and brutish people with a lust for battle and a love of mead and song.  They are however a race at war with themselves and the three Jarls battle for resources and land every few summers.
-Velk:  Velk are the barbarians of the south-west.  They border both Arcadia and the Commonwealth Empire but are busy battling with the many separate clans and the roaming troops of ogres. They are a hard and minimalistic people, wearing little more than furs and leathers and wielding very oversized weapons.  Their clans are constantly on the move and led by a chieftain and druid.

NPC Races

Fey
Also known as fairies, pixies, nixies, wisps and nymphs, fey are distant cousins of elves and dwarves and flit around on gossamer wings.  Fey are weak of body but are known for their tremendous magical powers.  They favor places of nature such as forests and fields.  Their mutual love, care and respect of nature means they tend to live amongst elven kind freely and comfortably.  Fey are tiny creatures that glow with a faint light but they can alter their size to be almost human or elf stature if they wish (though this is technically an illusion).

Giant
Giants primarily live in beyond the northern mountains of Frostreach.  Their homeland of Jotunheim is cold and uncomfortable for any other race in Orim and are only ever tormented by foolish human raiders and the occasional troll.  Giants are much larger than humans but still have many similar traits and skills.  Many giants have begun to move south but prefer places of higher elevation such as highlands and mountains.  They are known for their tremendous strength and durability and wield massive weapons in combat.  However for all their fierceness they can be gentle and kind to those who treat them well.

Mynog
Mynog are the mushroom people of the Underoot. They are merchants and farmers by trade and grow special mushrooms deep underground that have magical properties.  They are short of stature with a stubby white body and a humorous gait.  Their head is topped with a giant mushroom cap which can be red, blue, green, brown or purple in color and sometimes have white spots.  There are also very powerful mynog mages that guard trade caravans and help keep their giant cave turtle mounts in line.

Monsters

Basilisk
Basilisks are large brown reptiles the size of a bull.  They live deep underground, crawling about, hunting for living prey.  They have a venomous bite that can paralyze their prey as though they were stone and then drag away their food to feed on in a safer location.  They are known for having an unnerving visage as they have four eyes on their head.

Bogey
Bogey are spirits that feed on the fears of people, mostly children who suffer fear more than others.  Their appearance is random but often reflect the basic fears of children and people in general.  For instance its not uncommon for them to have features common with death such as a corpse-like body or a skull-like head.  Some have been known to look like scarecrows with jack-o'-lantern heads, especially during the harvest moon.  They are vicious tricksters that attempt to scare their victims to death while sapping their life energy.  Magic and iron are their primary weakness, making them not too difficult to deal with... its just catching them before they catch you that makes them dangerous.

Demon
Demons are red skinned humanoids with bat wings on their backs and black horns on their foreheads.  They feed on the souls of hapless victims either through seduction, battle or a contract.  Males are known as Incubus while females are known as Succubus.  Thankfully demons naturally only exist in the Abyss, a realm separate from the mortal realm and can only be brought to this plane by the intervention of a summoner.  Those who make a deal with a demon better make sure they have an iron clad contract or they may find themselves being fed upon instead.

Devil
In the Abyss, there are thirteen devils, each one is unique in its own way and each one wants a piece of the mortal world for themselves and eagerly await to be summoned.  However this is a very difficult task as the seven Immortals long ago placed seals to lock them in their own plane of existence.  However they each command legions of demons and imps to help coerce mortals into breaking the seals and releasing them upon the world.

Dragon
Dragons are some of the most powerful beings in all of Orim second only to some immortals and devils.  They are massive reptilian monsters with great leathery wings, horned heads, spiked backs and can spit deadly gouts of fire.  dragons are typically green in color though there are a few cases of black, red and white dragons appearing but this is rare.  While dragons are huge and powerful they are also witty and intelligent though suffer heavily from greed and arrogance.  A dragon is primarily driven by greed, amassing a horde of gold and gems that it guards in its lair till it eventually dies.  However dragons can live for centuries and terrorize a kingdom from its cavernous lair for generations till somebody brave enough steps up to the plate to attempt to put the monster in its grave.  Such battles are the tales of heroics and legend.

Drake
Drakes are tiny relatives of dragons and look very much the same.  However drakes are relatively harmless creatures... unless you are fairy, which make up their primary diet.  Because of this they can often be found in forests and nesting in small caves or hollowed out trees.  Not nearly as powerful or smart as their dragon cousins, drakes are known for one special gift, their ability to absorb and store mana like a living power stone.  They normally achieve this by eating fey in the forest however if they are the familiar of a wizard they can be fed mana directly and can help power a wizards spells and even help restore their mana pool.

Dryad
Dryads are highly protective forest spirits that look like elves made of wood and leaves with branches for antlers or horns.  They change appearance depending on the seasons and their mood changes as well.  Harming a forest inhabited by a dryad is dangerous as they can be highly vengful if their home is disturbed.  Later in a dryads life cycle a dryad will merge with a tree over the winter and become a hamadryad though this takes decades.  Dryads fear fire as they burn just as easily as any plant.

Elemental
Elementals are creatures born of the world around them, often summoned by sorcerers or particular powerful areas of magic.  Commonly an element will be formed of the material most present in the area, such as a mix of rock, dirt and vines or stone, ice and snow.  Rarely are they made of a single element unless they are made that way by a spell caster.  The rarest and most powerful of the elementals are the ones that make themselves of molten rock and fire.  Combating an elemental can be dangerous without a mage on hand to counter their elemental components.

Gargoyle
Gargoyles are normally just stone statues with a wild and demonic or draconic visage about them, however a skilled mage can animate these statues into living guardians of flying stone.  They are often used to guard towers and castles belonging to wizards or the wealthy.  Gargoyles are typically in alignment with their creator.

Ghost
Ghosts are the disembodied souls of the dead, haunting the places they died, trapped between the land of the living and the land of the dead.  Most are harmless and just confused about their state of being, however there are those who refuse to move on till they enact some form of revenge against those who killed them or perhaps they were just wicked to begin with.  Ghosts have no physical form and can only be affected by holy objects and magic.

Ghoul
Ghouls are corpse-like creatures that feed on the flesh of the dead.  How they get this flesh they aren't too picky about.  While a single ghoul will stick to digging up corpses in a graveyard a pack or horde of them can swarm a town and kill and eat at their leisure.  Ghouls are randomly "born" into the world as a waking corpse.  Nobody fully understands why this happens or how to stop it but they dig themselves out from their own grave and stop rotting so long as they eat at least once a week.  Typically their rotten grey forms can be spotted in graveyards or dotting a battlefield after the battle is over and the crows are feasting on the dead.  They are prone to being controlled via necromancy and often serve as guards and workers in a necromancers horde.  Ghouls are physically hard to kill but are very slow moving and dim witted.

Goblin
Goblins are the bandit scourge of the entire western half of Orim.  They are small, green skinned creatures with a nasty disposition and a vicious attitude.  Goblins are bandits and thieves by nature, picking on the weak and sick if they can.  Often goblins will form bandit camps hidden near roadways so they can raid and rob pedestrian travelers.  Goblins are normally cowards but are crafty at setting traps and using poisoned weapons.  Goblins become more bold when led by hobgoblins or redcaps.

Griffin
Griffins are powerful and noble creature that have traits of both a lion and an eagle.  These creatures have become very rare due to being hunted by dragons, trolls and ogres and typically seek sanctuary throughout the lands of Arcadia and Eldwood.  Griffons lay gold encrusted eggs that are worth a fortune on the black market.  For centuries they were thought to be no better than dragons but are in fact wise and spiritualistic creatures with a personal connection to a particular immortal that gives them the edge in combat against undead.

Hamadryad
Hamadryads are the elder form of dryads after they have fused with a tree.  These massive walking forest guardians resemble a giant humanoid tree.  Normally they spend their days and nights unmoving, however if their forest is harmed or disrespected they go on a rampage and trample and crush everything they see as responsible.  Like dryads they fear fire as they are just as flammable as any other plant.

Hobgoblin
Hobgoblins are the larger, tan-skinned cousins of goblins.  They are warriors and raiders by nature and bully goblins into joining their camps for a greater force in battle.  Hobgoblins are brutal warriors and serve as the primary muscle of any goblin army.

Immortal
There are seven individual immortal beings that are worshipped by many mortals on Orim.  Long ago the immortals locked away the thirteen devils in the Abyss to protect the mortal realm from their rule and now protect the thirteen seals so that it can never happen again.  Each immortal is vastly different from the next, both in appearance and in personality.

Imp
Imps are the "goblins" of hell.  Red skinned with big ears and small black horns and a mouth full of razor teeth, imps are ugly as little tricksters and potential pyrokinetic disasters.  They have a penchant for lighting things on fire to amuse themselves and are wild and unpredictable unless broken in harshly by their summoner.  

Kobold
Kobolds are reptilian beings that live deep underground in the Underoot.  They claim heritage to dragons and worship them like gods.  They are tough and lizard-like creatures who raid whoever they want if they feel they can win.  Most kobolds are human sized though some rare specimens called dreggs can grow large as a troll and spit busts of fire.  Kobolds are ruled by their most powerful sorcerers who guard themselves with dregg guardians at their sides.

Kraken
Krakens are giant, terrifying creatures resembling a squid or octopus.  They compete for territory with serpents and whales.  While its true that attacks from a kraken are rare, tales of them sinking ships with their massive tentacles are all too well known and keep most sailing vessels from venturing too far out to sea.  However the pirates of the isle of Krakens Nest have found some secret method of keeping the krakens away from their ships in deep water and have built an empire of thieves and brigands on the island chain to the west of the Commonwealth Empire.  Krakens have red skin, eight tentacle arms and two long whip like tentacles that they can use to snatch distant prey off a ship or even a beach.  Krakens are little more intelligent than an animal though some show a sort of alien intelligence and curiosity.

Ogre
Ogres are huge and brutish humanoid monsters with brownish-red skin, thick manes of black hair and square jaws with sharp teeth.  They roam together in small gangs, typically to the south, where they battle Velkish barbarians for food and goods. They often wear little or no armor but weild massive studded clubs to better crush their foes.

Outsider
There is very little known about outsiders, as there are only three mentioned of in myth.  Each are described to be slimy, tentacles things from some place of darkness and only wish to spread madness and terror.  If they are real then they could be even more powerful than devils and immortals.

Redcap
Redcaps are the most intelligent, most cunning and most vicious of the goblin family.  Lean and strong with grey skin and red eyes, redcaps quickly build armies of hobgoblins and goblins to wage war and conquer lands for goblin kind.  Redcaps commonly use the very best weapons they can find, even the more advance gunpowder based weapons found in the Commonwealth Empire such as firearms, bombs and cannons.  They get their names from the red hat they wear which is always soaked in the blood of their kills.  This hat is normally a bandanna or a tricorne cap.

Salamander
Salamanders are small fiery reptiles that thrive in molten environments but can get around pretty well without a source of fire.  They are orange in color and thick bodied with tiny legs.  Wizards and sorcerers often uses them as familiars as they can tap into their elemental powers over fire and are easy to tame as their primary source of food is coal.  They can be known to spit fire at any monster or person that tries to attack them in the wild.

Serpent
Serpents are large, legless, snake-like relatives of dragons who thrive in large bodies of water like lakes and the ocean.  They are deadly predatory monsters that prey on livestock and people if they feel they can catch them.  Just because they live in the water doesn't wean they cant slither up on dry ground to hunt for food.  They have a large head with a mouth willed with razor sharp teeth and a long muscular body to constrict larger prey to death.

Siren
Sirens resemble a combination of human and fish but seem to be strictly female in design.  They are covered in fine green scales and fish-like fins and are said to have a melodious song to hypnotize their land living prey.  They often perch on reefs and atolls, shrouding their perch in mist and fog and in groups sing their song hoping sailors will crash on the rocks and be easy prey.

Skeleton
Skeletons are the undead constructs of a necromancer.  They serve as archers and soldiers in a necromancers army and are easier to control and faster moving than ghouls.  Skeletons thankfully aren't very easy to kill in melee but are almost immune to arrows and throwing knives due to their skeletal nature.

Spawn
Spawn are humanoid sea monsters with traits common to both fish and frogs.  They are large and powerful and all appear to be male.  It is possible that they are the male counterparts of sirens.  They often invade coastal villages at night to capture prey and drag it out to sea.  If the city happens to have sewer networks of any kind they could infest them for weeks or even months, feeding on the homeless and the lost.  Some say that they can speak but speak only of horrible things in the dark and the deep.  Some say they speak of krakens but others say they might worship the mysterious Outsiders.

Spriggan
Spriggans, also known as fawns and satyrs, are denizens of many forests in Orim, but are most common in Eldwood and Arcadia. They look like a hybrid of a human and a goat with the head, arms and torso of a person and the legs and horns of a goat.  They are an uncommon site and mostly live a carefree life as bards and brewers.  They have a love for music and fun and often are very playful and friendly.  Some even become the jesters of great rulers and royalty.

Troll
Trolls are large, green-gray skinned monsters taht prefer dank, dark places to live such as caves, tunnels and the undersides of bridges.  While dim witted trolls are extremely dangerous monsters and are prone to eating livestock and people equally.  However trolls are rather dim witted as much as they are foul.  Bribing a troll with gold is a good way to get rid of it for a short period of time though it may still come back it gets bored with it.  Trolls are extremely tough and heal from wounds very quickly.  Fire appears to be their greatest weakness.

Vampire
Vampires are undead, blood drinking, masters of darkness.  Feared throughout all of Orim, vampires are thankfully very rare outside of Darkhallow in the far east.  A particularly powerful vampire count resides in Blackstone Castle, a towering fortress balanced on the edge of a coastal cliff face.  Vampires cannot stand the light of day and need to drink blood regularly to survive.  They are masters of necromancy and witchcraft and command armies of undead slaves.  Vampires are physically daunting, highly intelligent and all but immortal with very few ways to kill them being known. They can turn into a cloud of mist and summon swarms of bats to confuse their enemies.

Werewolf
Werewolves are extremely powerful monsters that appear on nights of the full moon.  Normally they are just ordinary people but at sometime in their lives have pissed off a gypsy and been cursed by the mark of the beast.  Now on the night of the full moon they are forced to turn into a werewolf and hunt for living prey.  Some people who are cursed have been able to control their werewolf forms after years of hard practice but are still loners by nature, fearing they may hurt others.  Werewolves are hulking humanoid wolf-like creatures with huge claws and teeth.  They are very strong and fast and fear almost nothing but fire and magic.

Wraith
Wraiths are powerful, incorporeal undead from the Realm of the Dead.  They rarely exist in the mortal realm unless forced out or summoned.  They are dark as night and faceless undead nightmares that feed on your very life-force.

Yeti
Yetis are a very rare creature found normally on the western Blue Mountain range of Frostreach.  They are large and hairy giants with a thick coat of white fur and clawed hands.  Normally they are peaceful creatures but if pressed for food or threatened they can become predatory and venture down from their mountain caves to hunt for prey.  They are extremely strong for their size and can lift and throw thousand pound boulders easily.