#what about elves? and dwarves? well-- what are their diets like?

[blujayonthewing]

one downside of deciding one of my OCs' dads is a dentist is that I've spent more time than I ever would have expected thinking about the biology of different fantasy races' teeth

[lotrthobbit]

Dwarf Princess 

Haldir x Dwarf!Reader

Warning: prejudice from elves against dwarves, angst, happy ending

a/n: For the sake of this story many things were changed in the original, also this has been in my drafts for about a year lol.

Deep within the forests where the birds sang surrounding a beautiful dwarf whom sat against a tree staring at her dear uncle chatting amongst the humans and the hobbits and his new frenemy, Legolas, the prince of Mirkwood.

She would not lie that he was pleasant site, he stood tall with long beautiful hair that fell down his back and broad shoulders that carried a head with a beautiful face adorned to it.

" Y/n" called Uncle Gimli. She got up from her seat and walked towards him," Yes uncle ? " she asked.

" What's got ya sitting by all your lonesome."

" Just thinking."

Legolas smiled at her and placed his hand upon her head, ruffling her hair as she pouted.

" Do not fret, we will soon pass over and then you can sleep peacefully on a bed." She smiled at him at the last word, bed. Oh how she longed to lay on a soft and fluffy bed, Do not get her wrong, she loved the great outdoors but she missed the comfort of her very own bed and the fluffy blankets that kept her toes warm and the morning cup of tea her mother would make her.

" I just hope we get there soon, even if it is just for a night."

" Well Lass, one more night in the woods will not kill ya." replied Gimli as he chucked. She sat down near the fire, feeling the bitter cold nip at her fingertips.

" At this point I feel like the cold will kill me before the orcs do." She chuckled as she looked up to see Legolas hand her some Lembas bread.

" Eat little one we have a journey ahead of us tomorrow."

" I AM A GROWN ADULT !" she huffed before golfing down the bread and beginning to set her cot near the fire. Legolas chuckled, he had grown quite close to y/n, he saw her as a little sister, after all it was her first journey and he felt a need to always protect her, that and her fascination of elves as he recalled their first encounter.

.

.

. flashback.....

" Uncle Gimli, look it is an elf."

" aye aye lass, be careful, they lack coordination and are coy."

Legolas chuckled to himself as he stood tall in front of the dwarf.

" funny for someone who can not even see over the table."

" Why you !!" That began the bickering friendship between the two while y/n was full of questions.

" how tall are you ?! What is your diet ?! Are all elves blonde ?! Where do you reside?!"

Legolas had never been asked so many questions in his life as of right at that moment.

.

.

.

end of flashback....

Gimli looked at his niece, she was in deep sleep.

" She is quite tall for a dwarf." Said Legolas.

" Aye..I believe her father was a human, although my sister never shared anything of it."

He nodded understanding that the topic was sensitive.

" Ill take first watch." said Legolas before Gimli turned around and said," What do yah think I am not capable of-"

" My friends there is no need to argue.." Aragorn spoke trying to defuse the situation.

.

.

.

The next morning was filled with dread, everyone was tired and the cold and hard ground did not aid their back pain. They simply longed for a warm home filled with delicious foods of all kind.

Aragron had pushed them to continue walking for hours without breaks or even lunch. Their stomachs were grumbling and the mud was piling on their feet making them feel as if the world was weighing them down.

" This is where Lothlorien should be." said Legolas as they continued trekking into the woods. It was foggy and ominous, nothing like the rumors that have spoken about the beauty of it. Legolas himself shared some stories he often heard as a small child about it.

"Daro !" spoke a voice commanding from the trees above. They all stopped as Legolas whispered to them to standstill and to not move a single muscle.

"who are they ?" whispered Frodo. " They are elves." replied Sam. Despite the fear in the other hobbits and even Uncle Gimli, Y/n could not help but feel excitement bubble up in her stomach, although she was also weary, perhaps they may not take a liking that they are stepping within their domain.

An elf dropped down in front of Legolas smiling, "Welcome!" They all looked around, they were surrounded by the elves pointing their arrows in case one wrong move was taken. " How many are there of you ?" asked an elf, Y/n's eyes widened as she stared at the elf before her, sure Legolas was beautiful but he, he was simply gorgeous, he stood tall and proud. Legolas replied with," myself, four hobbits, two men, and two dwarves."

" two Dwarves ?!" yelled the dwarf. " Is the woman a dwarf ?!" he questioned taking in her appearance, she was a beauty despite the mud on her clothes and the matted braids on her head, but she still radiated despite that.

" I can not let the dwarves pass." he declared, Frodo had done his best to try to reason with him, but another elf whispered in his ear that the Lady was expecting them. The elf presented himself as Haldir, he continued to explain that he would have to blindfold them in order to be taken to the Lady, whom was expecting them and turned to look at the dwarves, " keep a close eye on them."

Despite the beauty of Haldir, Y/n was hurt at his words, how could he say such cruel things when she had not done anything to hurt his trust. She pouted, but soon widened her eyes as she saw her uncle beginning to unsheath his axe and yell at the elves.

" We are not spies !" yelled Uncle Gimli, Y/n grabbed his wrist as she noticed the elves beginning to take aim.

" Uncle Gimli, we are on their land, we must abide by their rules and customs out of respect, the same way they would in our home." Haldir glanced at y/n she seemed uncomfortable with the accusation as she stared down at her feet rubbing her arm and tried to keep herself from looking at him.

he cleared his throat and put his axe away," very well."

As they began to be blindfolded, y/n could not help but hold her breath. She felt the cool fingers of Haldir push her hair behind her ears, his breath fanning her face as his arms came around to tie the cloth around her head and cover her pretty eyes. He questioned her lineage considering she was almost the size of an average human woman, but still quite a short stature. He grabbed her hand gently and began to lead her, unbeknownst to her, the rest of the company followed by grabbing onto a rope.

After some time, y/n felt the blindfold being removed, the sight before her left her speechless. The trees were tall and beautiful, the sun casting a beautiful glow within the forest, the air felt clear and pure, the aura of Lothlorien was unmatched. It was truly a sight.

" Lady Galadriel knows of your presence, you may wander freely." said Haldir.

As y/n began to walk away Haldir grabber her wrist," my apologies, my lady, can I perhaps show you something ?" He found himself bewildered that he even let his curiosity get the best of him, he wanted to find out more about her, he was also blinded by her beauty.

She nodded and followed closely behind, what choice did she have, he was holding her wrist afterall. From a distance, Legolas held Gimli back and smiled as the two ventured off somewhere else.

" Will you let me go you imprudent fool, that idiot is running off with me nice !" yelled Gimli

" now now, Sir Gimli, let your niece live her youth, she is a young woman afterall, she can make her own decisions." Said Aragorn.

.

.

y/n and Haldir reached a large tree. He let go of her hand and climbed up then looked back down to offer his hand towards her. She smiled and took it as he helped her up the tree.

" Is there something you wanted to show me ?" asked y/n.

" Look ahead."

There she gasped as she the vast land of Lorien, the beautiful light casting on the land, the calm waters and the beauty of nature.

" It is so beautiful." she said as she smiled and felt the wind tickle her cheeks. He stared at her mesmerized by the light in her y/e/c eyes," yes, it is."

She felt herself blush as she turned around to make eye contact with him. " Sir, Haldir, um...."

" just Haldir is fine."

" Haldir, may I ask, why did you want to show me this ?"

".. I...I don't know, I felt compelled to, as if we were destined to see this together." said Haldir.

Her eyes widened as she stared into the blue eyes of Haldir both leaning in, " Lass get down here this instant !" she felt herself almost slip if it weren't for Haldir wrapping his arm against her waist. He then held her and jumped down from the tree.

He landed in front of Gimli and Legolas," Watch yer step !" yelled Gimli as he tumbled back onto his bum.

" y/n/n, you just met this elf and you're already run off and been seduced ?! " yelled Gimli, causing y/n cheeks to turn a crimson red and stomp her feet," Uncle Gimli, I am not a child anymore ! And I am not being seduced ! Hmph." She walked away as Gimli tried to go after her but Legolas held him back sighing as he whispered to Haldir to leave at once before Gimli turned his attention to him.

It did not take long for them to meet again as a small feast was being held. They offered her a change of clothing, a beautiful lavender dress which she had not worn one since she left. She felt comfortable being freshly bathed and groomed. She had long waited to wash her hair and many of the Elven ladies helped comb and braid her hair which had grown throughout the journey. She sat next to her uncle at the table excited to eat, the seat in front of her was taken by no other than Haldir.

" You look beautiful " complimented Haldir, Y/n looked down at her lap and felt her cheeks flush as she thanked him for the compliment.

"tch." Gimli was angry at the interaction his young niece was smitten someone, an elf at that.

but that all changed when he laid his eyes on Lady Galadriel, she truly was a beauty and the air around her seemed to glow as she welcome them. The company could not help but laugh at seeing his cheeks turn red when she spoke to him.

" What was that about being seduced uncle ?" chuckled y/n. Haldir smiled to himself as he stared at her smile.

The feast went on smoothly, many retreating to their sleeping arrangements. Y/n spoke to Lady Galadriel briefly and she spoke about loving someone, y/n was confused as to why she would talk. about that but Lady Galadriel smiled," my dear child, afterall you are still young and have such a long life to live, do not fret and continue forward." She thanked her for such encouraging words as she walked away to go to sleep.

Somehow Lady Galadriel had a worried gut feeling.

The next morning the company was to leave, Haldir felt saddened that he did not get so speak to y/n, but was content when he saw her in his dreams that night. He felt a connection and could tell they were destined."

" Haldir, perhaps we may see each other again." smiled y/n

He smiled as his bent forward to place a kiss upon her hand and looked into her eyes and spoke once more," I have a feeling we will my Lady. " He said and smiled sweetly.

Despite the two barely meeting, they had a feeling that they had lived before, perhaps in their previous life they were lovers.

And yes, they met again but in unforeseen circumstances, as they fought against the orcs in Helms-Deep, protecting the people of Rohan, the elves of Lothlorien came to aid the company and the army of Rohan.

When y/n laid eyes on Haldir, she could not help but smile at his presence. They all fought bravely, to the end, but once the battle ceased, y/n tried to look for Haldir. She was held back by Legolas

" Legolas, let me go, I need to find Haldir." She felt a gut wrenching feeling, " Please y/n.." Said Legolas. She finally broke free and saw the Many dead men and elves. but her eyes traveled to where Haldir laid. HE was still blinking looking up into the sky. She quickly fell to her knees and called out

" Haldir !" she felt the tear rushing down her cheeks as she stroked his cheek trying to clear him of the blood that stained his pale skin.

He reached a shaky hand and placed it against her cheek, he began to speak," I do not know why the stars led me to you, but I...I-I am glad to have met y-"

" please save your energy, you're going to be okay !!" yelled y/n as she gripped his hand tightly. She kept repeating to herself 'you're going to be okay ' , but it was far too late as he let out his last breathe. She placed her forehead against his and closed her eyes as she cried out silently to herself. The company whom had been separated from Master Frodo and Samwise stood looking at the two, Aragorn himself could not contain his sadness as they all mourned the death of many, especially the death of an ally.

Gimli felt pain for his niece, but did not know what to do other than place his hand at her back. She did not want to let go of Haldir but Gimli told her they must. She placed a kiss on his forehead and stood up fists at her sides. She decided in that moment she would avenge his death.

And she did, together with lady Eowyn she found the strength within her and the company to strike down Sauron and many Orcs. She fought bravely.

Upon returning to Rivendell where many elves had now taken their departure to Valinor. It was now time for her departure as well along Bilbo, Frodo and Gandalf. Her uncle and Legolas were going to stay behind but as she looked into her Uncle's eyes she noticed tears within them. " Do not cry Uncle Gimli, we will be reunited soon, please take good care of him Legolas."

She embraced the both of them as she cried and soon they set sail.

Just as Haldir predicted, they soon met once again....

The End

[scoutpologist]

just saw something in pinterest comments about how hobbits might have a hummingbird-like metabolism and i’m honestly really interested and fully believe that. it makes me wonder about the metabolism of other species in middle earth.

starting with hobbits, they have seven meals a day and are VERY small, which means all that energy has to go somewhere. in the lotr movies we see sam (i believe?) eat multiple pieces of lembas bread, an elven bread made to fill the stomach from one small bite, indicating that hobbits can eat a LOT of food and possibly require quite a lot. it's also unlikely that every daily meal for hobbits is a full meal. it seems to be more intermittent snacking than the huge plates we're used to. from this we can assume that hobbits function a bit like birds, eating often and more than expected for their size throughout the day, expending that energy with their movement (as small creatures tend to have faster heartbeats).

elves clearly have very slow metabolism but don’t move slow to compensate for it, most likely for magic reasons. from what i can tell, they also almost exclusively eat plant-based food. i think that elves don't seem to enjoy or care for eating except only as a practicality, hence the existence of lembas bread. i can only assume that elvish food is imbued with a sort of magic to help sustain those who eat it. i'm not sure if they have proper crops or if they simply have gardens.

dwarves i imagine require a lot of energy as well because of the huge amounts of energy they expend. based on the "dwarves are natural sprinters" line (which is hilarious, yes), i think we can assume that they're built for large amounts of energy intake and expelling that energy fairly quickly. it's indicated that their diet has a lot of high protein meat in it as well. this would make sense for a people that does heavy manual labor and lives in areas (caves) that wouldn't have much ability to grow crops.

obviously humans are, well, humans, and have human metabolism. there's not much to comment on there. not gonna worry about orcs and goblins because they're not really explored that much lmfao

also this was all made without referencing any official writing on metabolism, culture, or food for each species so. address accordingly

[taylor-titmouse]

What does an average meal for a human, fuck elf, dwarf, and goblin look like? Are there any dishes that are reserved for special occasions? Are there any cultural points of divergence like dwarves eating something that the fuck elves would be like "absolutely not" about?

uhhh. well i'm removing fuck elves from the question just because i'm Still not entirely settled and satisfied on their lore.

dwarves and humans eat more or less the same things and have similar diets, though dwarves have a higher tolerance for alcohol and prioritize fatty foods for weight gain. goblins eat whatever they can get their hands on, and have a higher tolerance for "disgusting" things and raw food. they like cooked food, but they Can eat raw meat and it's not an issue. a goblin will see a rat and ask if anyone is going to eat that and then eat it without waiting for an answer.

[frodothefair]

I have to wonder, just how much do you think hobbits experience/experiment making foods from other cultures - elves and dwarves and men and such? Like on the one hand news travels slow and ideas travel slower in the written post and library era of information traveling, but the thing is that people were very *clingy* with what cultural novelty they could have in similar times, you know? If you were someone who found like a recipe card from another *state*, much less another country or culture, you would put that shit in the most secure place you possibly could! Er, well, at least my family did, lol. This would be why there is a family in northern Kentucky that's been making fresh pasta for the last like 100 years or so with no relation to Italy whatsoever. Long story, lol

💐 ASK ME about my headcanons about hobbits and the Shire! 💐 Want to know if yours has been answered? Check here.

Unfortunately, I don't think hobbits are particularly fond of foreign food, and don't readily incorporate it into their diets. I base this solely on Sam's line "I don't usually hold with foreign food, but this Elvish stuff, it's not bad," as well as my general understanding of hobbits as insular and rather distrustful of all things foreign.

That said, once hobbits do try something, their love for food is likely to eclipse all other considerations, so I suspect that if they tried a foreign food at the encouragement of a friend, they are likely to enjoy it. Does this necessarily translate into asking for the recipe or trying to reproduce it at home? Not necessarily. I think it depends on how much the hobbit likes the food and how "adventurous" they are.

I do have a headcanon, however, that the four hobbits who visited Minas Tirith ended up trying various mediterranean-style dishes, since climate-wise Gondor is similar to Italy or the south of France. As such, the Gondoreans likely cultivate olives and catch fish, and both of these products lend themselves relatively well to being canned and preserved.

...Do you see where I'm going with this?

The hobbits probably tried antipasto dishes of various kinds, including tiny sandwiches of cold cuts, olives, sardines, caviar, vegetables and cheese. I also think that elevenses is traditionally a finger food type of meal in the Shire, though I have no particular basis for thinking so; I just do. Be that as it may, however, since olives, sardines, and caviar can be canned and transported over long distances, the four hobbits might have easily had some brought to the Shire, and incorporated into their appetizer platters, and shared it with all their friends.

[hologrammana]

So in my story, I write on the side when I am not on tumblr.com far far to often or at my job.

I was tackling fantasy creatures what exists vs whats just mythology.

Because it is set in a broadly real world but with ya know, cosmic anomalies, magicians, psychics, monsters, etc etc we've been here before.

So I wanted to TRY and do something unique with the fantasy humanoids and this is what I decided to do. In order to keep a hidden world vibe I really had to think it over, my rules were thusly:

No alternate dimensions, I thought that felt lazy for me personally, I wanted people who knew what to look for could find a repreive of elves in India or orcs in a french forest.

Avoid normalizing the fantasy while allowing someone who is informed about things to loosly catagorize creatures

Don't tolkienize stuff, I didn't want to just rip off JRR Tolkien as it was roughly set in modern times, a bit before in the late 90s I wasn't to worried but it was a good reminder

What I ended up doing is roughly catagorize 3 lineages while fleshing out some stuff on my own.

Elves, for whatever reason I went with their diet when thinking of elves, instead of the vegan high and mighty elves I went weird and scary, eating sweet and fatty bloods the sweeter and fattier the better. Elves have the most overlap with faries with kidnapping humans in myth but the myths of hags and other uncanny valley myth creatures make up elves, if a creautres form is changable a shapeshifter or the like vastly increases their chances of being elves.

Orang Bunians

Haltijas

Jinn

Satyrs

Qallupilluit

Mazapéguls 

Patupaiarehe

Svartálfar

Dökkálfar

Ljósálfar

Yumboes

Imps (None Demonic)

Redcaps

Rakshasa

Centaurs

Empusai 

Mermaids

Selkie

Kitsune

Tanuki 

Dwarves, I kept the idea of earth related grudgeholders but I wanted to include dwarves in tales of little people, primarily adding fastidiousness and helpful overall generous nature to them. Even dwarves in norse myth gave plenty of gifts and items upon request shift their attitude and there you go.

Gnomes

Domovoy

Guhyaka

Fions

Dwarf (Eddic/norse)

Pygmy (Greek)

Eloko

Kappa

Orcs, fantastical the orcs are not orcs or as I am tempted to renames the catagory to Ogres are well man eating more monsterous humanoid myths and the orcs keep that being man eaters all the way down. Unsubtle and commanded by their baser urges but not nessesarily dumb just different values. I also wanted to include one of my favorite tropes the sun banishes monsters, so orcs get that to various intensities. Some could definitely be added but from what I could find I think all these fit.

Goblins

Jotunnar

Oni

Ogre

Troll

Cyclops

Gigantes (greek giants) its also a food lol

Mapinguari

Ke’let

Tengu

Anyways I would love to answer questions about this thing I just babbled about if anyone has any it would also help me procrastinate so asks are much appreciated in that regard.

[modern-inheritance]

"Dark Magic"

*Rubbing temples*

Paolini never really defines dark magic in Inheritance Cycle. It's most frequently associated with Shades and Galbatorix. Durza taught Galbatorix 'dark magics' before he went on his traitorous rampage. Durza uses 'dark magics' to give Eragon his curse (??? look I'm still not fully clear on wtf Eragon's seizures were, we could go into a full side tangent rant on this but I digress) and used it in a variety of other ways. There's scattered mentions of 'dark magic' throughout the books beyond these.

But we are never told, as far as I am aware, about what exactly it is. What we know of magic is that it is typically shaped through use of the Ancient Language, some creatures, like dragons, can effect the world through the use of instinctive magic, and that magic in other cases and places just appears in the world (floating rocks, etc, though come to think of it no wait stop sciencing).

In this TED Talk I wi– I'm kidding. We're here to talk about MIC adaptations again.

MIC has always been a bit of a science experiment. In the later books we can see Paolini really using science to explain what happens when Eragon or others craft certain spells. Hell, he even uses coding in Murtagh, which made me grin a bit. I'm awful at it but If/Then statements are coding 101 kinda things. But a lot of the time we are left in the dark (pun somewhat intended) on how certain things work.

I (have I??) explain some things via science/biology/etc in MIC. Elves bones have to be stronger to resist their innate strength or else they'd shatter their skeletons every time then did something with force, so I adapted the Spartan-III augmentations of Titanium Carbide replacing the typical materials of calcium and whatnot. There's a weird bit of their diet that changes because of that. I have a few others but that's the main one I think I spent ages going over in my head.

So what is 'dark magic?' How do we explain it scientifically, or in context of the mix of language and science that the IC magic system is based off of?

WELL!

I just realized I don't remember what I was LANGUAGE!

RIGHT! WHY DID I TALK ABOUT SCIENCE?!

I am currently writing a story about Eragon's seizures and what people are doing to see about finding a cure. This requires me to look at dark magic. And since we have no canon idea of if dark magic would draw from the same language as 'regular' magic, making it just...regular magic with inherently dark motives, which is boring, I decided to change it up a bit.

The Ancient Language is, well, ancient. One day I will spell Language properly without autocorrect but here we are. Although AL (it is not today) is considered locked in, I wouldn't be surprised if there were other languages and/or dialects of AL. The dwarves and the dragons are the 'true' inhabitants of Alagäesia (were-creatures?? more like where did they come from but again, I digress)–

and you know what I just read the Ancient Language and Grey Folk pages on the wiki and now I'm kinda mad bUT I'M DOING WHAT I'M DOING ANYWAY.

Long story short: there are several different dialects of AL, influenced by a lot of different factors. The dark magic Ancient Language dialect was created by shades and other malevolent creatures w/ sentience and magic usage, and is purposefully absolutely fucking convoluted, varied and jumbled with lots of uuuuh what's the word influence fuck I just had it

the caster can choose and mix and match their syntax and structure at will. to prevent their curses from being undone unless you were present during the casting and know almost word for word what was said and used for the curse/spell. The dragon's magic that undid Eragon's curse was basically like a cleanse and used dragon's instinctive world weave magic to rewrite Eragon enough that he sorta DNA mixed (sorry Paolini, in MIC we do get some fun DNA rewriting because Ket wants the science....mmm....science......) with elf code and a little bit of dragon code (possibly, I'm a little on unsure on this, elves are already a mix of their original base with dragon code due to the orignal bond and I'M GETTING OFF TOPIC AGAIN) and he became different enough that the curse no longer worked and because he was uh...well, he was kinda factory reset. It wiped any and all spells attached to his body.

uh

okay. I...think I made my point. I'm...I'm sorry I just completely lost my train of thought after 'attached to his body.'

um.

Have a good day, I guess.

[philosophicalparadox]

The outlook on this depends entirely on what version of each you look at.

Dwarves were originally Dark Elves, (and weren’t short) and their hallmark boogeyman thing was hiding in rock formations and ambushing people, as well as casting illusion spells aimed at disorienting them so they’d get lost and die. Also haunting them with visions and nightmares of their own reflection doing bizarre things up to and including cannibalism. Which they may or may not wake to find they’d actually committed.

Elves unto themselves are a category of Fair Folk, dark or not, which means they are extremely varied. However there ARE dark elves and…well not quite “light” but rather just. Not-dark, elves. And there is something of a distinction between them.

Anyway, broadly speaking non-Swartz Alf are tricksters. They’re a bit like cats. Mostly benign, occasionally benevolent, sometimes malicious for their own entertainment. They come in just about every shape and size, but the pretty ones that look human are usually the ones to be wary of, same as most folk tales. They don’t share the Celtic Faerie habit of not lying, but they are known to be pretty frigid — literally or otherwise— and can shapeshift into all sorts of strange things.

Diet isn’t something that I think ever gets mentioned mythologically, but it’s probably true that across the broad category that is Elves, which includes Dwarves (Dwarg in the original) that there are both omnivores and carnivores and possibly herbivores, and also heterotrophs — some elves are plants, themselves, or turn into them like Dryads. (Which is not a coincidence).

Hot take of the day: elves fucking eat meat. Of course they fucking do. They hunt. Dwarves are the vegetarians. Or like mushrooms and tubers or whatever.

[ravingancient]

The Neverseen is violent because its members don't eat gnome food

One of the many questions about the Neverseen is how they commit violent acts without going mad from the elvin mind's inherent inability to handle guilt. But what if I told you that elves don't have an inherent inability to handle guilt? What if I told you that it's likely caused by gnome-grown vegetables?

I don't care if I sound crazy. Let's go over the evidence.

Animals in the Sanctuary are turned vegetarian by feeding them gnome food. Apparently, they get used to it because some gnomish produce tastes exactly like meat. The problem is that feeding predatory animals a convincing meat substitute does nothing to suppress their hunting instincts. Humans call it fox-in-the-henhouse syndrome. A fox will kill every hen in a henhouse, even though it can't eat them all. Predators with enough to eat will still hunt. It's the same reason well-fed dogs can still be hunting hounds and well-fed cats still catch mice, to give more human examples.

Still, all Grady and Edaline do to train the animals is feeding them gnome food. They never do anything that specifically suppresses their hunting instincts. So how do the animals stop hunting? Unless...

Eating gnome food is what suppresses their hunting instincts.

By extension, a member of an intelligent species who eats enough gnome food would have any violent urges quelled. Gnome food turns people into pacifists, and this affects almost the entire elvin species.

The entire species except the Neverseen, of course. When Keefe was in the Neverseen, he said that their food is awful because it isn't grown by gnomes.

Yes, Sophie didn't eat any gnome food while in the human world, but she didn't have a reason to commit crimes. Elves are more aggressive without gnome food, but not to the point where they'd commit crimes for no reason. The Neverseen has a vision they're fighting for.

Humans aren't the only intelligent species capable of violence. Elves rely on goblins for protection not only because goblins are stronger, but also because goblins are more willing to fight. Goblins and ogres are warrior species, trolls have an army of super strong children, and dwarves at least have fighters that they sent to Mount Everest and the ambush in Loamnore. Elves and gnomes are the only truly pacifist species, and they just happen to live with each other.

My guess is that when gnomes use their special abilities to grow plants, a bit of their peaceful nature becomes part of the plant. Anyone who eats the plant gains that peacefulness.

In conclusion: Gnomes are inherently peaceful. Elves aren't; they turned pacifist after switching to a diet of solely gnomish plants. Elves that stop eating gnomish plants revert to their true nature, which is capable of violence. This is how members of the Neverseen avoid breaking from guilt.

[afoolandathief]

For the Ides of March, have this Something Wicked excerpt (TWs for language, blood, alcohol and death):

“Why’s it seem like I’m getting more of the stink-eye than usual?” he asked, pausing to wipe his mouth with a handkerchief — because he was a fucking gentleman like that — and cocking his head at Iris.

Iris busied herself with wiping down the ancient oak of the bar, her own eyes not meeting Caz’s.

“Caesar’s dead,” she said.

“Oh,” Caz said. “Well, I didn’t kill him.”

Most Fae didn’t go by their true names, at risk of it binding them in a spell. Elves opted for flowers or plants as green and pretty as they were, and dwarves precious metals. But Caesar had aspired to something as big and shiny as the casinos lining the Strip. The little hobgoblin spent most of his days conning tourists out of their own names, and, if that didn’t work, their social security numbers.

Caz couldn’t blame him. Everybody’s gotta eat.

“You sure about that, Caz?” Iris was saying, he realized.

“Yeah, Iris,” he said, pulling himself out of his stupor. “I’m on a new diet, remember? Only the most scum-sucking, absolute pieces of shit for me.”

Iris muttered something that sounded suspiciously like “You are what you eat,” but he let it slide. He’d walked into that one.

“Come on, Iris,” Caz continued. “I liked Caesar. He was like a son to me. Well, a scummy, purple-toned son thousands of years my senior, but still.”

“Yeah, you seem real broken up about him,” Iris said, mixing an Irish coffee and sliding it down to the banshee who’d been playing piano earlier.

Caz eyed the shaggy-haired pianist and snuck another sip from the flask. What did Iris expect? He had seen so many come and go in his exhaustingly-long lifetime. He couldn’t pull out his mourning garb every time the local con man kicked the bucket.

“How’d he go, anyway?” he asked, as delicately as he could when his lips were going rubbery and numb.

Teal flesh pulsed in and out as Iris sucked on her cheeks.

“They found him sealed within a salt circle, with 23 iron nails jammed in him,” she said.

She cast her eyes down as she closed the tub of pork blood used exclusively for Caz’s drinks.

“Would your witch know anything about that?”

The liquor burned uncomfortably in Caz’s gut. Shit. There were only a select few who knew how to kill Fae like that.

Taglist, because I haven't shared a thing with a Something Wicked tag in a while: @author-a-holmes, @avian-writes, @diphthongsfordays, @drippingmoon, @ellierenae, @faelanvance, @joaniejustwokeup, @leiwritess, @mjayatlas, @purplezebraproductions, @rhymingteelookatme, @thegreatobsesso, @thelaughingstag, @vylequinne, @writing-is-a-martial-art

~

[whumpster-fire]

Having several thoughts about how gnolls are really cool as a basic concept but hot damn D&D 5e’s lore for them is absolute garbage, and... seriously, Tieflings are in the fucking Player’s Handbook now but gnolls are just Too Demonic For Players? Does someone at WotC like, have something against hyenas or something?

So I’m posting my fanmade gnoll rework concepts that I’ve had for years and I’m finally accepting I’m never gonna fucking use.

Just

Fucking

Base it off actual hyenas as a starting point. Think about what hyenas are actually like compared to other predators.

For ability scores, A lot of the playable gnoll races I’ve seen give them high strength or dexterity, which is kind of a weird one because I don’t think hyenas are particularly dexterous, not compared to other predators like cats. They’re pursuit predators with relatively good endurance, they have really good immune systems that make them effective scavengers, and they’re pretty darn hard to kill. Gnolls’ biggest physical stat bonus should be Constitution, absolutely no question, with strength next. For mental stats... hyenas are really smart by animal standards, and good at cooperative problem solving in particular. Being bad at any particular mental stat in D&D/Pathfinder doesn’t really fit with that, but if the system requires a stat penalty for balance reasons Charisma is probably the best one to put it in to represent the cultural and body language barriers between gnolls and... well, non-furry humanoids.

7′ tall, 300 lb gnolls is kind of bizarre since spotted hyenas are pretty close in weight to humans. Wikipedia lists 198 lb as about the heaviest weight for them. My headcanon for this is that gnolls are supposed to be human-sized-ish, but the clans a heroic adventuring party is most likely to get in a fight with are, y’know, the ones that are basically demon cults, and have a significant number of 7′ tall monstrosities as a result of interbreeding with demons.

Spotted hyenas are matriarchal and females are bigger and stronger than the males. This shouldn’t be reflected in RPG stats other than a difference in the height and weight stats basically get ignored unless someone needs to carry an unconscious character or something, for the same reason that ability scores ignore sexual dimorphism for every other race in the game and... does any culture in D&D canonically have strong gender roles by default besides the Drow?

Having a super-short lifespan is technically not “unrealistic” for an animal-based race, but it’s... just really player unfriendly, especially when half the party’s probably playing elves and dwarves that live like 300 years.

Other traits: Give ‘em low-light vision, disease resistance (not poison: disease specifically). Gnolls have powerful jaws and should have a natural bite attack, but like... most of the time natural weapons on a humanoid shouldn’t actually be very useful in armed combat because... yes it can do serious damage, but so can a fucking spear, and you can run someone through from a lot farther away than you can bite them, and not have to expose yourself to someone driving a fucking knife through your chin while you’re trying to rip their arm off. If you give gnolls any other gimmicky combat ability, it should be based on teamwork or survivability / making it a miserable process for someone to attack you.

I’m kinda ehhhh on gnoll subraces, other than maybe giving demonblood gnolls their own stats.

Okay so for gnoll culture... first of all we have to figure out how to handle Yeenoghu, and there’s two ways of handling this that I like.

Option 1: Yeenoghu is actually just the gnoll war goddess, but is believed to be a demon lord by most other cultures based on rumors spread by people at war with gnolls, and... like, literal demonization your enemies’ gods is a common phenomenon throughout history IRL. This is best for a low-magic campaign where the gods don’t get involved enough to correct these misconceptions.

Option 2: Gnolls are a cautionary tale of what happens when demon cults aren’t stopped early. Gnolls actually have/had their own patron deities, but they’re now powerless to protect their people from Yeenoghu’s followers, and they’ve overrun a significant portion of the species. Not so much through conversion as through conquest as subjugation and extermination, except now they’ve reached such a critical mass and become so much of a threat to other cultures that it’s turning them against the surviving non-cultist clans, and some of them are starting to convert by “choice” because they see it as the only way of surviving that’s left.

With this one, I really like the idea that Yeenoghu is actually female and the widely known lore gets her gender wrong due to a translation error / misinformation / because of very human gender stereotypes causing people to assume that female demon lords are all the sneaky, subtle, corrupting/tempting types and that a demon lord of sheer brutality and destruction would obviously be male. This misconception persists because Yeenoghu’s followers are too busy eating people to discuss pronouns.

The other really important factor driving gnoll culture to evolve in certain ways is that gnolls are obligate carnivores. Their diet needs to be mostly meat, whether living or dead, and in a medieval-tech society, unless it’s really high magic I don’t think a sedentary gnoll community would be able to produce enough food to support themselves. However this doesn’t require gnolls to be hunter-gatherers / survive by raiding.

Seriously guys. Nomadic pastoralist gnolls. Or at least transhumance. Gnoll shepherds, using domesticated hyenas as herding animals. Or if you’re doing a Western AU... consider, and I’m just saying consider this as an option: Gnolls in cowboy hats.

However, in warfare this also creates the darker side of even non-demon-worshiping gnolls. They’re predators, and biologically adapted to be scavengers, and in any premodern setting an army marches on its stomach. It is way harder for gnolls to keep a fighting force supplied, especially if the enemy is burning their own fields and any livestock they can’t take with them. Why would they pass up free meat? Even if they have a taboo against cannibalism unlike real hyenas, do humans really count as cannibalism for a gnoll? Not eating enemy corpses would be a huge handicap for them.

This, of course, tends to make most other cultures hate gnolls if they’ve fought them in recent memory, and resort to tactics like poisoning livestock or corpses, or infecting them with contagious diseases (disease resistant doesn’t mean disease immune, IRL spotted hyenas can still catch diseases like rinderpest). Unfortunately in gnoll culture that is considered a war crime.

Seriously though, hyenas are cool, gnolls are a really cool concept if you actually make them basically anthropomorphic hyenas, IDK if I have to eat my “Not A Furry” card over this.

[ren-c-leyn]

Is there an industry in your world that dominates all others? I'm talking things like how Dwarf cultures in fantasy normally focus on mining. If so, why is that particular industry so dominant?

-copper-coin-writing

Hello! Thanks for stopping in. In the Plight of a Sparrow, there's different industries depending on the region. My answers got a bit away from me again, so I'll be putting it under a read more.

In the Dwarven territory there is a focus on mining, but an even higher focus on tinkering and building things. The mining industry grew as the tinkering did, and the tinkering came about as one part necessity for finding clever solutions for their environment and the war, and one part the natural curiosity they were created with. As a result, you'll find several smiths focused on building strange parts for various tinkerers within dwarven communities as well.

High elves have a large fishing industry, and a high demand for the services of water wizards. They also have hatcheries dedicated to essentially farming fish much like we farm livestock. This is a result of their lands being predominately swampland, lakes, rivers, and other bodies of water. There isn't really that much in the way of farmable land, and most of their gardens are either indoor or floating, so fish is a large staple of their diet.

Wood elves have a large concentration of hunters, as their forests are thick with both game and monsters. They also have an industry built around using the parts of monsters to make weapons and armor, think of the monster hunter game series. These arms and armors are prized both inside their own communities and by foreign warriors and adventurers.

Moon elves have a massive alchemy industry as well as many schools for different kinds of magics. These were around long before the war, cropping up as a result of them being the most magically inclined of the races as well as their unique sacred treasure, but it grew with the war to supply the demand of their allied armies. As a result, there are also large farms dedicated to growing the herbs and other ingredients required for the potions. However, it has had the unfortunate side effect of also increasing their slave trade to work these large farms.

Humans don't have a particular industry that's more prosperous than the rest, as their territory is one of the more diverse in the world as far as terrain goes. They do, however, tend to have more farms than the other territories as they have a lot of plains and other fertile lands that are good for livestock and crops.

Dark elves have a booming mining industry and a high concentration of weapon and armor smiths. The mining has always been a big part of their economy as they live underground and dig out their elaborate tunnel systems to live in, but the weapon and armor smiths increased dramatically with the start of the war.

Vampires have a lot of more luxury focused industries. Tailors, fine fabric manufacturers, jewelers, artists, ect. It's a bit complicated to explain why, but the basics is thier status depends on showing off fine things. Which leads to the darker side of their luxury industries: thieves for hire and slavers. I'm not sure how long they've been apart of the society. I imagine, to some extent, it's always been there, but the war really brought it out of the shadows and to the foreground. I imagine there's a huge market full of goods plundered from foreign cities with domestically stolen goods mixed in, as well as slaves, who are also both foreign and local.

Orcs have a large science community, which, like the dwarves, is both a matter of necessity and their own curiosity. They also have a large number of smiths dedicated to building weird stuff. They have several book binders and libraries. And probably several small industries that cropped up and grew around their search for knowledge. In addition, as they too live in mountains they hollow out, they have a large mining industry as well as several weapon and armor smiths.

No one knows what they fairies do. They fairies will never tell you what they do.

The beastmen used to have a large trading industry, but it's declined sharply since the most recent pushes in the war and thus they have probably built up their own industries to become more self reliant until the heat dies down again.

Thank you for stopping in. I hope you have a lovely day/evening.

[transhitman]

Nobody asked but I wanna talk about my OC universe. Specifically the biology of the human species because I think it’s cool as fuck. Basically, homo sapiens is extinct after nuclear winter and all the fantasy races are the different evolutions of the human species with adaptations that allowed them to survive. There are 6 total and they’re all sort of like combinations of two or more more traditional fantasy races so yeah.

H. magus -- HUMANS -- Only named as such because they’re the only ones that don’t have a major outward change in physiology. They look pretty much the same but are a little bit taller on average and can have gold or purple eyes. They survived via the magic of invention and Literal Magic, and mostly stayed in one spot. They sat on resources and created pretty capitalist-leaning societies, and thus didn’t have to undergo any major changes. However, there are still enough small differences to qualify them as a different species than H. sapiens, namely that their bodies conduct magic really REALLY well.

H. bucerus -- OGRES -- Sort of like a mix between tieflings and orcs. They’re descendants of the people who were ostracized from the Human communities for whatever reason, and had to deal with radiation, harsh weather, and GIANT FREAKING SHADOW MOSTERS. Since the Human ancestors were sitting on all the resources, the proto-Ogres were forced to become nomadic. In order to survive the Badlands, their muscles became much more dense, granting them super strength. However, they also weigh twice as much as a Human of the same volume and require twice as much food. They also developed methods of dealing with cancer caused by the radiation of the world. They basically integrate tumors into their bodies as horns. They have a special type of white blood cell that specifically targets cancerous growths and forces them to the surface of the skin, where they can be removed. They also have tails, which suit their environment. There are different variants depending on the global region they’re from, each with different horn and tail types. Probably the sexiest species. They’re tall ^__^ But their size is limited to like 7ft since being too big and dense would be DISASTEROUS in the food-scarce Badlands.

H. gurges -- DWARVES -- Ok so they’re honestly more mermaid-like, but I’m trying to fit a theme with the names here. They are short, though. And most of them live in cities that are below the surface, just not a solid surface. The Dwarves are descendants of the seafaring survivors of the Pacific Ocean. There is actually a wide variety that could count as dozens and dozens of separate species, but for function’s sake they’re all under the same category. They have convergently evolved with different types of fish, getting less and less human-looking the deeper in the ocean they live. On the surface, they’re just people with fluorescent skin tones. In the Abyss, they’re barely even human. They are able to withstand enormous pressure, and notably can form symbiotic relationships with sessile sea life. Sponges and barnacles and the like often grow on their bodies, sometimes in a very stunning, very beautiful way. Though the people closer to the surface are short, those deeper in the water grow to be gigantic. One of their subspecies includes the Extremophiles, who live in the deepest part of the ocean. They can reach about 20ft in length when counting their tails. It’s unknown weather these Extremophiles age, or what they really do down there. The Dwarves outside of the deepest Abyss usually live in underwater cities, on the coast, or on floating oil rig-type things. They’re all normal.

H. hiems -- ELVES -- Elves are sort of a combination between elves, giants, and general undead creatures (skeletons lol). They’re fucking massive, and live in only the coldest areas. Their skin is usually a shade of grey, tinted by the type of mineral that is the main staple of their diet. They eat rocks. Yeah. In fact, their bodies are so fucked up and adapted to their barren environment that normal food can easily kill them. Sugar specifically is HIGHLY toxic. Because they don’t process food the same way, they’re skeletal. And 12ft tall. Basically, slenderman. Though they aren’t bald. They have pale down-like hair on their heads. They also have another strange diet habit, which developed as a result of food scarcity during the beginning of the apocalypse. They have a very different culture surrounding cannibalism. Though the consumption of entire bodies is Not A Thing anymore, having your loved ones consume small parts of your body after your death is a very important ritual. It is an acknowledgement that the soul has gone, and the body has become empty matter. The other big thing about them is their special Suit Magic, in which a symbol of one of the playing card suits appears somewhere on their body when they go though puberty. The different suits grant them different abilities, and the four suits have divided into factions which were once at war with each other. (Blood (hearts) is healing. Edges (diamonds) creates shield constructs. Blades (spades) is bolts of energy. And Fists (clubs) is bludgeoning-type weapon constructs.) However, Elves are now extremely isolated up in their mountains and tundras. Very territorial. People honestly sort of hate them cause they’re also a little bit specist.

H. invictus -- MONOS -- Mono stands for monochrome. Predictably, Monos are monochrome. Arcane albinism overwrites their natural skin tone, and instead turns them a sickly white color, tinted by their subspecies hue. Everything else on them is jet black, including their blood and organs. Or, it’s that same hue color. They’re really fucked up, honestly. They’re sort of supposed to be a mix between vampires and orcs. They’re an artificially created species, made via eugenics and dark magic. Their creators were aiming to make an unkillable army, and they sort of succeeded, but at the cost of prevalent genetic defects. Around 70% of the Mono population has some sort of disability, which really isn’t a huge problem. They’re more than capable of providing medical care and creating accessibility deceives like prosthetics and magic medicine. You can do crazy shit with technology these days! In fact Monos were engineered to be compatible with tech- oh their creators were fascist eugenicists who abused them and treated them like disposable garbage specifically because of the disabilities they themselves caused though carelessness and forced inbreeding? Well. Alright. Not how I would have done it but... Anyway, long story short, the Monos pulled a 180 at some point and broke free of all that shit. Because they’re sort of a genetic mess, they have really great healthcare out of necessity. They’re the most technologically advanced species on the planet rn, but all of their scientists are engineers and doctors, not warriors, so they’re at constant risk of being annexed by Humans. Monos also have a very low fertility rate, so the percentage of whole-blooded Monos is going way down. They’re close to being endangered at this point. Luckily, some guy figured out how to grow babies in tubes but that’s a story for another day.

H. unicus -- DOWNDEEPERS -- Ok, Downdeepers are just all the miscellaneous designs I came up with that didn’t make sense as one of the other species lol. They’re the decedents of the people who fled to the newly-formed Downdeeps cave system, which is a global system of caverns that goes really fucking deep underground. The high concentrations of magic there cause Downdeepers to mutate rapidly. No two of them are the same. They all just live in tha caves... hell yeah...

The last human species are the CHIMERAS, which are really just the people who are a cross between two or more species. They were rare at first, but they had a population boom after global travel was reestablished (somewhat, anyway).

There are a couple other inorganic races I could talk about but I’m gonna leave it there. Yeah nobody asked for this but I hope you thought it was neat. I am honestly really proud of this world I think it’s cool as hell : ) yeah. And if you’re wondering how all the species can be cohesive despite their ancestors being isolated in different parts of the world (specifically Ogres, who live on every continent and don’t have a common ancestor), that’s because of some meta shit that has to do with how magic and human will interact. Collective subconscious shit. And that would take like 3 pages to explain so like. Just go with it for now lol.

[weaselle]

Hey, do you think you could do an 'Old World' post, like the one you contributed to before? The one with the huge trees and ground sloths and musk oxen being goats. I ADORE that post, and I'm hoping to see more eventually. Please don't feel like you have to, I would just enjoy it :) hope you have a good one!

do you have any idea how much I appreciate being asked to talk about something I’m interested in!? Thank you, I’d love to

Imagine this: It’s 100 thousand years ago. There are dwarves, trolls, goblins, imps, giants, a couple kinds of elves, the First People (those that came before us all) something that might later be called seraphim, and many strange monsters. 

I’ma talk about monsters in a minute. Let’s talk about those other things, the like, fantasy races. Now, I don’t have time for every one of these, so I’m going to cover one I have the most information on. Dwarves

A sister species of humanity that is short, broad, bearded, some with red hair, lives in caves in the hills and mountains, are superb crafters, making instruments, wearing intricate leather outfits and known for creating large expertly made axes and hammers. Dwarves, right?

Or did I just describe Neanderthal

See, the earliest stories of dwarves from Scandinavia are confusing, because sometimes they talk about them being small or short, but sometimes talk about them being enormous. And that’s actually perfectly explained by Neanderthal

Check it out. Neanderthal, while noticeably shorter on average, were BUILT big. Look, it’s not just the cranial capacity, the eye sockets are larger, the nasal cavity is larger, the mandible is thicker, the teeth are larger, the bone around the ear and eye is  thicker. Looking at these skulls you would assume the person on the left was far bigger than the person on the right, and you would be correct, in every way except height.

So when the earliest stories of dwarves sometimes talk about them being short, and sometimes being massive, this situation matches. Neanderthal were THIC. But they averaged about five foot four at a time when humans in the north were passing 5 foot nine

That’s only averages tho, so sometimes it would be like a 5.1 Neanderthal and a 6.1 Sapiens, but sometimes it would be like, a 5.6 inch Neanderthal and a 5.3 inch Sapiens. Which makes the early myths make even more sense:

me, a 5.5 neolithic farmer, whose community of farmers trend toward the short side, having met my first Neanderthal, a 5.8 man built like a bear twice my weight and three inches taller than me “the Dwarves are massive! giant! huge!”

you, a tall hunter from a community of hunters who tend taller than average, who runs into Neanderthal several times a year and knows they are usually nearly a foot shorter than you are “you mean the little people?”

I’m pretty sure that humans were actually the elves that came in both dark and light varieties in these Scandinavian myths, but that’s a whole topic involving the way that invaders often adopt stories of the people they invade. But there are other species, not just Neanderthal and Sapiens and Denisovans, there was also at LEAST one other sister species we’ve found genetic proof of within our own genome. And who knows what relatives of ours were living only on the exposed continental shelves of the last 100 thousand year ice age? So there are a lot of options for elf.

ANYWAY

I like to think of all these sister species of humanity as being these fantasy races. I know I mentioned goblins and imps, and all I have to say is if you’ve ever seen videos of people dealing with baboons or macaques in some town somewhere, you can appreciate what a population of humans who were much closer to wild themselves might think of similar species.

NOW. Monsters.

Not only are there many strange animals to pick from, but I use a fun thought process to include almost anything I want.

See, when you say a creature lived from X time to Y time, it’s because we have some bones from X year, and we have some bones from the same creature dated to Y year. That’s great for describing what we know for sure.

But for what MIGHT have been, for what’s possible, you can extend the range

It’s pretty safe to assume we didn’t get a fossil of literally the last of them to live. So if I want to think about how a mythical creature sounds just like a real creature, but that real creature was from a time half a million years previous to the culture, well, that could still be a match.

Consider the Siberian Unicorn also known as Elasmotherium sibericum a species of rhino. We thought they went extinct 200 thousand years ago, which would have made them unavailable for the time period we’re talking about. But then we found some bones from between 30 and 40 thousand years ago, which means they might have out survived the Neanderthal!

Now consider the Coelacanth a 4-6 foot fish we were sure went extinct with the dinosaurs. Turns out we were wrong by about 75 million years, because they’re still alive today

So clearly, as long as there is somewhere preserving approximate environmental conditions, any number of things could have far different periods of existence.

Like, we know of Denisovans, a whole sister species of humanity, from a handful of bone fragments. This is the biggest piece of Denisovan bone we’ve ever found

That’s part of a jaw. And along with a handful of small bone shards, some teeth, and the tip of one pinky finger, it’s the only physical evidence we have for the whole species. Except that we managed to get a whole genome from the miraculously well preserved pinkie tip. This branch of humanity split from us at roughly the same time as Neanderthal, and modern Tibetans owe their genetic adaptation for higher elevations to human interbreeding with the Denisovan people. They existed for about half a million years, and the only hard evidence we have is a handful of bone pieces. From like two locations.

So if something interesting could be explained by a population of Neanderthal or Homo Erectus living outside the age range of the bones we have, that is entirely possible. Depending on how far outside, it even becomes LIKELY, because, again, we’re never going to get the LAST one that lived as a fossil, fossilization is so rare.

WHAT I’M TRYING TO SAY IS THAT THE OLD WORLD REALLY WAS A WORLD OF GIANTS AND ELVES AND DWARVES AND MONSTERS AND MAGIC

wait, did I say magic? Yep. Consider this: there is a magic valley in Africa that kills anything that goes into it at night. lizards, birds, people, they just... die. But not every time - a person can walk through it during the day and be fine, or sometimes at night too. Turns out there’s a large pocket of carbon monoxide underneath that leaks out constantly. In the day, the heavier than air gas creates a layer along the ground and collects in dips and hollows, but in the cooler temperatures of night drifts up six feet or more. So you might walk into the valley and be fine, but it gets a little cooler, or you walk down hill for a bit, and boom, carbon monoxide poisoning. It can take only a couple minutes to kill you.

Viola, one Cursed Valley.

Or! Imagine you are a human from 40 thousand years ago. You find a grave, you dig it up, somebody was buried with something like a wooden axe or sword (these things exist, it’s all about the density of the wood, the wedge shape, and the weight -- a heavy wooden sword can definitely decapitate a person, and we’re taking about a time when metal was rare or non existent). But THIS wooden weapon, while clearly wood, also sparkles like a gem in the light, is hard as stone, doesn’t burn if put in the fire... THAT’S a MAGIC WEAPON.

It’s also petrified wood.

This is the world I’ve been researching for my book Stone Punk, which I’ve only managed to write one chapter of so far

I would be so happy to write so many more posts about this, I’ve been researching the first domestication of wolves, cave art, neanderthal diets, ancient Indian, Russian, and Chinese myths... all kinds of things, but this post is long enough -- hope it was close to what you were looking for Anon!

[anderseeds]

I saw a Witcher/Hellsing crossover mentioned in the tag and I was just inundated with ideas for it, so I’ll ramble here instead of attaching a tl;dr to that post. I’m a huge fan of the Witcher, and yet somehow I’ve never actually considered a Witcher AU for Hellsing (and Andercard of course; it’s my modus operandi). This is based on the Witcher games, books, and a little bit of the The Witcher RPG since the Netflix show isn’t my thing. 

First of all, for the unfamiliar:

Witcher = a person (usually as a child) that has been mutated and trained to be a monster hunter. They have greater endurance, enhanced healing, enhanced senses, are able to drink potions that would be deadly to the average person, and can perform a small degree of magic called ‘signs’. One can tell a person is a Witcher by their eyes, since they look like cats eyes. Sometimes Witcher’s have other indications, but the eyes are the most consistent feature.

To become a Witcher, a candidate must go through three trials. All of them are exceptionally difficult and painful. The first two trials, the Trials of Grasses and Dreams, basically break down the body through use of various potions and rebuild it, while the third is basically a test for those who survive the first two trials. Very few children put through the trails survive; sometimes there’s only one survivor among those brought in to undergo the trials, and those who die do so in complete agony. Understandably, many Witcher’s are bitter about this whole ordeal and resent being turned into what they are. Witcher’s are also regarded with suspicion and dislike and no better than the monsters they kill, which makes being a Witcher even more torrid.

Vampires = vampires in the Witcher aren’t like your traditional vampires. They’re a race rather than creatures born of humans and they reproduce as any other creature does. Lesser vampires are generally unintelligent, beastly, bat-like creatures, while Higher vampires are intelligent and near indistinguishable from a human. Higher vampires often live among the other races and can integrate well, though some choose to live only among their own, and a rare few even stay with Lesser vampires. While Higher vampires are very different from their Lesser counterparts, they can turn into giant bats or similar creatures.

Higher vampires also don’t need blood to subsist. They can eat whatever they like, but some vampires do drink blood because blood is addictive to them and offers an experience not unlike drinking alcohol. Blood also has rejuvenating and strengthening qualities to it. Lesser vampires do seem to drink blood as part of their diet.

Honestly, Witcher vampires require a lot of explanation, so here’s the wiki for them. They’re a really interesting take on vampires.

Conjunction of the Spheres = a point in history where different dimensions collided with the world of the Dwarves and Gnomes and various different races fell through rifts and got trapped there. At the time the books start, they’ve all been there for well over a millennia and have thoroughly integrated. 

Anderson: 

Since Nilfgaard is based on the Roman Empire and has a religion functionally similar to Catholicism, I think it’d be appropriate to place Anderson as being from there. He’d be proud of being Nilfgaardian and would introduce himself as a Witcher of Nilfgaard alongside mentioning his guild. But being a Nilfgaardian Witcher is kind of an oxymoron since the Witcher schools were around before Nilfgaard started spreading through the South, and Witcher’s aren’t actually wanted or really used there anymore... in fact, the school most strongly associated with Nilfgaard - the Viper school, which is where I’m placing Anderson - was straight up destroyed by Nilfgaard. An Emperor (Upsurpur of Fergus var Emreis, specially) tried to take over the School of the Viper, failed, and then the Nilfgaardian army destroyed their keep and banned the Viper Witcher’s from entering core Nilfgaardian cities. Nowadays, most Nilfgaardian’s barely know what Witcher’s even are. Viper Witcher’s are thoroughly displaced; unwanted and relatively unknown in the South, reviled in the North, and with no keep to take refuge in, but Anderson still considers himself Nilfgaardian and is loyal to the Empire and the Great Sun despite no longer being welcome in his home city. He’s also has loyalty to Emhyr because he always regarded Fergus’ son as the rightful Emperor during the Usurpers reign and he’s happy when Emhyr returns to take the throne.

Before all that happened, Anderson grew up in various orphanages in Nilfgaard, going first from a decent one in the City of Golden Towers, and then to an over-packed and impoverished one closer to the border. Support for the orphanage eventually fell through, and almost all the children ended up at the Viper school when a Viper Witcher saw an exciting opportunity to expand the guild and took all the boys. Anderson went on to become a Witcher, while all but one other orphan died during the trials. 

The potions used on Anderson were experimental and had a lot of vampire components for regeneration purposes. Anderson has a chip on his shoulder about that and specialises in hunting vampires as both a consequence of his hatred, and because his enhancements make it easier for him than his fellow Witcher’s. 

Continuing under the read more since this is getting long.

Since Anderson’s trials emphasised regeneration, he has very accelerated healing and benefits hugely from Witcher healing potions. To accommodate his frequent use of potions, Anderson has a very high tolerance, which has been strengthened by both himself and teachers in his youth by repeatedly testing his limits. In battle, he tends toward longer blades than his fellow Viper’s and keeps a multitude of them on hand. He’s particularly good at using them as projectiles. His signs are used on occasion, but not often; everything but his Yrden and Quen are relatively weak. Sometimes he uses potions to bump up his Igni.

He’s also just a well-read and educated as he is in manga/OVA. The School of the Viper highly valued knowledge, so all Witcher’s received a decent education. Anderson built on this by attending lectures at academy's during his journeying and has visited and appreciated Oxenfurt Academy a few times despite it being a Northern institution.

His visual mutations are fairly mild: bright green, slitted cat eyes and slightly pointed canines. He gets the same sort of toxicity appearance as Geralt in the games if he takes too many potions (reference). He can pretend to be human with some effort, but the eyes are hard to hide since the pupils are slitted and they have a degree of luminescence. 

While the keep still stood, Anderson collected information on the Wild Hunt alongside his fellow Witcher’s. He also became a teacher of young Witcher’s, but many of them died during the conflict at the keep and more still when Viper’s had to remain on the path year round instead of wintering at their home. Eventually some of the remaining Viper’s did start wintering at other places/keeps despite their reclusive, secretive nature, but a lot of Viper’s simply remained on the path year round. Anderson is among those who rarely chooses to winter and will instead travel to a warmer climate to do work. 

Many provinces in the south are... fairly safe and prosperous, so Anderson often travels around all the Continent to find work. He has some disdain for Northerners like he does Protestants in canon, especially since they treat him like a monster while most Nifgaardian’s don’t even know what he is. Basically, Melitele and the Eternal Fire are stupid, Elves are hot respectable beings, Northerners are barbarians, dwarves and gnomes who??, and god don’t even get him started on Skellige. Typical Nilfgaardian in his opinions. 

Alucard:

Alucard is a little harder to figure out since I like to think of Alucard as one of the vampires that arrived during the Conjunction of the Spheres, and we don’t actually know all that much about the world vampires came from... the books have basically nothing. The games expand on vampire lore by giving us three tribes and links to Etruscan civilisation, but its still slim pickings. Since Alucard stayed in society and assimilated, I think it’s fair to say he was part of the Gharasham tribe. 

I also think vampires were generally peaceful since if one kills a fellow vampire in the games, they’re rejected and pursued by vampire kind. That might not be the case in the world vampires came from... but since other vampires are the only ones who can kill a fellow higher vampire, they would have to be somewhat peaceful to accommodate their longevity and near inability to die. Alucard might have warred once or twice, but it isn’t until he encounters humans that he really starts going off the rails. 

Over a thousand or so years, Alucard kills humans for fun and consumption and gets into human husbandry. When the Witcher’s start being made, numerous of them try to kill him over the years, and all of them fail... until a group surges in together and defeats him. He’s consequently stuck in a state of non-death for a century before a fellow vampire locates him and helps him reform. Luckily, Alucard doesn’t return to his awful ways, because a century of being isolated and stuck in a never-ending state of fear taught him a lesson in basic decency. He develops some respect for humans, and especially for Witcher’s. 

His interest turns to observing humans and Witcher’s instead, and they’re a lot more complex and interesting than he gave them credit for. Especially a certain green-eyed Witcher who seems to particularity dislike vampires... he does, however, still indulge in blood on occasion, since he sees no issue with drinking of those who seek battle with him or do ill unto others. Maybe innocents get caught up in that sometimes, but he doesn’t deliberately go after them these days.

On top of being a higher vampire, Alucard would also be an Elder vampire since that seems to be the case for all vampires who came during the Conjunction of the Spheres. It fits the fact that the Elder vampires are incredibly, incredibly powerful beings. Staying true to canon, he’s perhaps the most powerful of Elder vampires, being among the first to arrive and active enough to keep him in peak form, while other Elder vampires are withered recluses. 

Since he partakes in so much blood, it could qualify as a drinking problem... but he drinks so much of it that its gotten to the point that it rarely negatively impacts him. 

Together:

Alucard finds himself fixated on a vampire hunter Witcher he hears about during his journeying. They clash a few times, and Alucard thoroughly impressed with Anderson’s abilities and it convinces him to tail Anderson through the North (and occasionally in the South). It takes decades for Anderson to warm up to Alucard, but Alucard’s thousands of years old; he can wait! And he does, doggedly pursuing Anderson until they develop an amicable rivalry. 

This would probably take place after or before the events of the main books (not the short story ones). Otherwise, there’d be an awful lot going on around them.

[shit-lets-be-dungeons]

World Building June in July: Day 3

Who lives in your world?

As stated, the world of Terra Faerma is not completely removed from the traditional structure of Forgotten Realms, or similar places in the greater Dungeons & Dragons multiverse - but, where the pieces fall can be very different. For example, while the “traditional 5 races” exist here - Dwarves, Gnomes, Halflings, Elves, and Humans -, their relationship to one another and their history at the point of the year 10K413 of the Age of the Violence Storm should give some indication into Terra Faerma’s alternate position.

Dwarves in Terra Faerma are in fact kin to Giants; Giant-kin in fact can be differentiated amongst the greater Humanoid family by the severe reduction of their ears, as opposed to Goblin-kin with their more pronounced ears. Specifically, Dwarves as giant-kin came about within the shadow of their much, much larger cousins, coming to depend on the hierarchy to the point of many dwelling inside the bodies of vast Titan-giants. In the modern age, the dominant Dwarf-culture rules from deep Underkingdoms, with a hierarchy extending deep beneath the surface of the planet. Dwarves are also defined by a deep history and legacy; it was a combination of their records and Elven book-keeping that defined the current understanding of the 9 Ages of the Dreaming World. Names are kept, remembered, and rarely recycled, with a single Dwarf often going by a combination of many names. There is an emphasis on immortality, having one’s name or deeds extend far, far beyond the lives of their peers. 

Gnomes are also Giant-kin, but while their cousins the Dwarves have built themselves beneath the surface, the Gnomes keep close to Nature. Gnome-folk have contributed much to the healthy ecosystems of the Overside of Terra Faerma, enough so that they can form the cornerstone of many small environments. They know the tongues of beasts and plants, and much of their magic is dedicated to keeping the balance between their civilization and the bounties of the natural world. Gnomes rarely seem to live together, but only to the untrained eye; beyond the Material Plane, there are vast demi-planes built through Gnome-homes that expand and accommodate hundreds of thousands. Gnommish culture is particularly entranced by novelty - there is a distinction placed on coming up with something that no one else has come up with before, or mastering a skill that no one else has (even if that skill contributes nothing). It is believed by some that the traditions of certain adventurous classes - Bards especially - were constructed on particularly Gnommish traditions.

Halflings, through tangled taxonomies, are more closely related to Goblins than they might perhaps be to Elves or other Bigfolk. Distant ancestors of theirs, the Kender, excelled in picking apart the hypocrisies of larger civilization, and when the Giants fell the Kender grew ever smaller. Their history is shrouded in secrecy by design; much Illusion and Abjuration magic is spoken in the languages of the hills. There is a prevalent belief amongst the clans that the Halfling story is but the dream of a greater spirit, and that if told too much will make holes in the plot apparent, and so fade away forever. Equally narratively-minded, the Halfling clans and warrens respect above all else Great Folk who make individual names for themselves, though it is a great honor to be named after many heroes at once.

Elves, as implied, are related to Goblins - they and many others in fact make up the “Goblin-kin” side of the greater Humanoid family tree. Through this, Orcs are understood to be a kind of Elf, as are Humans. While those species have identities that are altogether inclusive, however, Elven culture is exclusionist by nature. There is a great splitting up of the Elven family into a variety of “sub-races” - from High Elves, to Wood Elves, to Shadar-Kai and Eladrin, to even the protean Wild Ones or the wayward Star Children. Elven history begins with what is called the Great Sundering of the Elves, wherein some ur-ancestor of all the kinds of Elves were separated by some great disaster, and in that isolation drifted apart as they found new magics and Blood-Cures to define themselves. Speaking of Blood-Cures, these seem to be what make the different Elves endemic to one another - Trances, the innate magical abilities, and even details like the strict vegetarian diet are encoded through long-lasting curse-magics laced throughout generations at birth. Elves tend to live alone or in closely-knit groups, though happily willing to dominate others from their towers. The concept of the Overlord began with the Elves, as the Underking did with the Dwarves.

Humans are technically a kind of Elf (but never considered such by the Over-Councils), and are unique in their soul-potential. There is a fascinating quirk when it comes to the shape of their souls – it is believed to be “Tripartite”, and at a certain point in time the same individual Human can be a ghost, a revenant, and an ancestral spirit-guardian. The vast majority of organisms cannot do this, and certain spells (like Resurrection) won’t work for creatures with only the “Dipartite” soul, so Humans have picked up the strange stereotype of monstrous necromancers and mindless undead-fodder. Still, it is the humans who have filled the cities and tracked the roads of Terra Faerma, and over the last 20,000 years have defined themselves as god-makers and adventurers in turn. What’s more, perhaps through the unique soul-potential of these creatures, Humans have been capable of intermingling with many disparate species, even over the course of the Blood War when alien planes and planets intersected with the Material. Tieflings, Dragonborn, Genasi, Aasimar, and even Half-Elves and Half-Orcs are but a few things considered “human” in these societies.

There are many, many other organisms capable of speech, civilization, and the arcane arts on Terra Faerma as well - from the bizarre Aberrations like Beholders and Illithids, to the many groups of beast-folk that live amongst the margins. The beast-folk, especially, are numerous, with essentially any group of beasts (hyenas, cats, birds, etc.) seems to have a sentient, somewhat humanoid representative. There are certain beast-folk who have actually banded together in response to opposition from the Humanoids as “gnolls” - hyena-folk, tuatara-folk, bat-folk, and opposum-folk are but a few species that make up this socio-political group.

Similarly, there are many groups of Goblin-kin and Giant-kin that tend to join Orc society, usually making their livelihoods within the Brutelands. The tradition of Orc-Quantum defines citizenship being limited to Orcs, as Elven or Dwarven societies might limit their citizenship to Elves or Dwarves - but, “orc” is defined almost like a state of mind. Bugbears, Goblins, Hobgoblins, Ogres, Lizardfolk, and even groups of Humans or other Elves are welcomed as orcs within these sprawling societies.

(art here by @Canadian-witch - follow their blog for more excellent fantasy art)