The great lands of the different races are the most settled and successful and thus have experienced the greatest advancements in technology and industry. For some, like the elves, these traditions extend into the vague and distant past. For others, such as the tribes of southern humans or nomad peoples, this is a much more recent occurrence. Rather than use the crude coal and wood burning engines of some gnome and dwarf communities, the greater civilized lands have developed advanced public works using magical aid, built magnificent machines powered by magic, or even built on the steam engines of the gnomes by using magical techniques to produce heat or alchemical substances to boil the water.
This has generally been to the betterment of the various races. While there will always be those who shun magic as evil or technology because of mistrust, in large cities most people have access to clean running water due to sewers and filtration systems and pumps. While general society still uses horses, carts and hard labor, in the greatest cities many often float down streets on flying sedans, carriages that move without a horse, and disks of force allowing passengers to float a dozen feet from the ground as they travel.
The dissemination of magical technology is so great that in the largest and most powerful cities, rulers have come to realize that a healthy and educated population is far more capable than the poor downtrodden of less advanced cities. A population where disease is less common means more young men and women to serve in the army, greater numbers of laborers, and more successful merchants. All of this means money for the state and less crime to deal with. On the other hand, not all nations have benevolent or enlightened rulers. Some city-states capable of feeding and caring for their population through magical technologies instead use their power to increase their control of their people. They force their will and objectives on the populace and crush dissenters. Governments that treat their people this way do so far from the great centers of human learning and power because the threat is always there that a ruler of a powerful and enlightened nation will deem it time to liberate the destitute population from their ruler and take control of the city.
In the largest cities merchant-wizards use golems or other automotans as hired laborers for special projects that require strength far beyond an adult human. They use spells to lift and move large piles of material, send messages between patrons, and even to whisk merchandise instantly to far off locations at the behest of those willing to pay. Sealed or hidden messages can be delivered by magic or via enchanted animals while beasts summoned from other planes can be used as body-guards, investigators or even for more sensual delights.
Magic has even grown to allow the image of famed bards to be transmitted through small objects such as mirrors, to be enjoyed by those a mile away from the performer, reaching hundreds or thousands instead of a handful. Such devices have been used to deliver news to the populace, broadcast proclamations or great speeches, and to allow clerics to bring the teaching of great scholars into poor neighborhoods.
All of this has come from harnessing the primal force of magic in ways that ancient shamans and sorcerers wouldn't have dreamed. Beyond crude fireballs and lightning bolts, these ways of improving the health and well-being, and therefore the happiness and spirit, of a people are more powerful than any one archmage could ever be.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Magic and the Primal Kerithar
The force of magic is very present in Kerithar. It is like a force, a natural element just as fire, air, earth and water are elements, and as a druid might manipulate those energies, an arcane spellcaster would manipulate the energy fields of magic and shape it to his will.
It is known that magic is highly tied to the health of the land and the natural elements, just as the world is a balance of the four primal elements, so too is magic part of the balance. The presence of concentrations of magic, if not carefully structured and channeled causes perversions of natural plantlife, of creatures and of the land itself. These concentrations can cause storms of arcane power where the elements attempt to balance out and the magic to drain away and leaving destruction in their path.
Some races have grown to be able to manage this balance through generations of practice and observation. Elves are the most adept at this as magic runs in their veins and fills their being. Dragons, the most magical creatures of all, are sensitive to this but rarely make the effort to control the force. Some humans are adept at it, having learned through long and hard research. Other humans are the cause of the concentrations and disturbances. Gnomes are adept at creating vast illusions, though they have a more difficult time sensing the disturbances. Dwarves sense the concentrations of magic, although their perception of it is vastly different than others, but their working of great rune carvings and channeling into magical formulas is as powerful as any human magic.
Among all the races are those who are touches by the force in such a fundamental way that they are able to channel it from the inherent power and connection in their blood. In some cultures these people are embraced and celebrated while in others they are seen as anathema and thrown from their community or even killed. These sorcerers stand apart from the more tradition bound ranks of wizards who must learn over musty tomes and grimoires to access the arcane forces. Mistrust and misunderstanding between these two groups is common, especially in cities with strong traditions of magic, but the gods of magic embrace and encourage all expressions of magic.
It is known that magic is highly tied to the health of the land and the natural elements, just as the world is a balance of the four primal elements, so too is magic part of the balance. The presence of concentrations of magic, if not carefully structured and channeled causes perversions of natural plantlife, of creatures and of the land itself. These concentrations can cause storms of arcane power where the elements attempt to balance out and the magic to drain away and leaving destruction in their path.
Some races have grown to be able to manage this balance through generations of practice and observation. Elves are the most adept at this as magic runs in their veins and fills their being. Dragons, the most magical creatures of all, are sensitive to this but rarely make the effort to control the force. Some humans are adept at it, having learned through long and hard research. Other humans are the cause of the concentrations and disturbances. Gnomes are adept at creating vast illusions, though they have a more difficult time sensing the disturbances. Dwarves sense the concentrations of magic, although their perception of it is vastly different than others, but their working of great rune carvings and channeling into magical formulas is as powerful as any human magic.
Among all the races are those who are touches by the force in such a fundamental way that they are able to channel it from the inherent power and connection in their blood. In some cultures these people are embraced and celebrated while in others they are seen as anathema and thrown from their community or even killed. These sorcerers stand apart from the more tradition bound ranks of wizards who must learn over musty tomes and grimoires to access the arcane forces. Mistrust and misunderstanding between these two groups is common, especially in cities with strong traditions of magic, but the gods of magic embrace and encourage all expressions of magic.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
The Beginning
No one really knows how the world was created. Even the elves and dragons, who are the longest lived of the races and have the oldest memories, can't account for how things came to be. All anyone knows is that at some point the cycles of the great empires began. First came the ancient Jannaar people, and it is their name that has been applied to the continent that they had conquered. No Jannaar are known to survive, their race died out before the rise of the elves, but they were first challenged in the north by giants and in the east and south by dragons. From that and internal struggles their power waned and with that diminution more and more of the land came under the control of others.
Now, giants and dragons by and large had no use for forests and the clearings that had broken the tree line in places or where land had been cleared by the Jannaar for their cities and farmlands. Humans were not much more than grunting brutes living in caves, but a few had been taken in and kept by jannaari and taught knowledge that would let them climb from their caves. These gathered in tribes and began to spread. In the meantime, giants and dragons clashed. The great giant kingdom which had taken hold of most of the north, and the dragons, who had spread from the south up to the farthest ice reaches of the north, fought fierce battles that then would open up vast areas of the trees. During the centuries of their battles, the human tribes around the twin lakes at the center of the continent and to the west along the sea, and the elven clans who had grown strong and powerful after the arrival of other cousin races of elves brought profound arcane magic to compliment their nature magic, formed kingdoms of their own.
These great empires stretched across the northern ares of the continent, sending satellite groups to colonize southern forests, which resulted in several kingdoms that were cut off during later years. Great cities were crafted and amazing works of magic were wrought until lies led to betrayal and then to murder. It seemed as the the entire elven race would fall apart when as suddenly as a falling star, it ended and when those other races living in the shadows of the great empires looked on the elven race, they had disappeared, retreated deep into their hidden forest homes.
It was not long after when the dwarves appeared, having been hidden away in mountain fastnesses and cut off from the outside world, they revealed themselves at last and claimed their own nations in the mountains and hill lands. Their presence came just before the awareness of humans to the presence of the small gnome people who, like dwarves, preferred mining, though in lower hills and with surface communities and friendships with neighbors. After the elven powers disappeared, their most powerful protectors were gone as well. It was this time which was known as one of the dark ages of the gnomes, and they adapted quickly to the use of the illusion magic they'd learned from the elves, and to defend their homes. These appearances were followed by the even more strange migration of the hin people, the halfling races which wandered in tribes and clans from somewhere else. Neither the already established races nor the hin could say which land they'd come from and most scholars decided that they must have come from another world or plane as they didn't resemble any other group in the known world.
Of all the peoples large and small, though, the human peoples showed the most natural adaptation. They moved quickly between surroundings, spreading in a generation to control pieces of lands that had once been the refuge of mythic people. Their magic and technology progressed too and sored to great heights as those deemed worthy learned at the hands of elf masters. Some, however turned to darker ways. These are the ones who would cause one of the single most defining moments in the eons.
Now, giants and dragons by and large had no use for forests and the clearings that had broken the tree line in places or where land had been cleared by the Jannaar for their cities and farmlands. Humans were not much more than grunting brutes living in caves, but a few had been taken in and kept by jannaari and taught knowledge that would let them climb from their caves. These gathered in tribes and began to spread. In the meantime, giants and dragons clashed. The great giant kingdom which had taken hold of most of the north, and the dragons, who had spread from the south up to the farthest ice reaches of the north, fought fierce battles that then would open up vast areas of the trees. During the centuries of their battles, the human tribes around the twin lakes at the center of the continent and to the west along the sea, and the elven clans who had grown strong and powerful after the arrival of other cousin races of elves brought profound arcane magic to compliment their nature magic, formed kingdoms of their own.
These great empires stretched across the northern ares of the continent, sending satellite groups to colonize southern forests, which resulted in several kingdoms that were cut off during later years. Great cities were crafted and amazing works of magic were wrought until lies led to betrayal and then to murder. It seemed as the the entire elven race would fall apart when as suddenly as a falling star, it ended and when those other races living in the shadows of the great empires looked on the elven race, they had disappeared, retreated deep into their hidden forest homes.
It was not long after when the dwarves appeared, having been hidden away in mountain fastnesses and cut off from the outside world, they revealed themselves at last and claimed their own nations in the mountains and hill lands. Their presence came just before the awareness of humans to the presence of the small gnome people who, like dwarves, preferred mining, though in lower hills and with surface communities and friendships with neighbors. After the elven powers disappeared, their most powerful protectors were gone as well. It was this time which was known as one of the dark ages of the gnomes, and they adapted quickly to the use of the illusion magic they'd learned from the elves, and to defend their homes. These appearances were followed by the even more strange migration of the hin people, the halfling races which wandered in tribes and clans from somewhere else. Neither the already established races nor the hin could say which land they'd come from and most scholars decided that they must have come from another world or plane as they didn't resemble any other group in the known world.
Of all the peoples large and small, though, the human peoples showed the most natural adaptation. They moved quickly between surroundings, spreading in a generation to control pieces of lands that had once been the refuge of mythic people. Their magic and technology progressed too and sored to great heights as those deemed worthy learned at the hands of elf masters. Some, however turned to darker ways. These are the ones who would cause one of the single most defining moments in the eons.
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