Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

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ghype
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

Post by ghype »

Celtic_Minstrel wrote: April 20th, 2020, 11:56 amI will note that it's probably not good to have the merchants calling the shots. They would have some influence, certainly, but they're hopefully not the ruling class.
"merchants have their own guild, which is influential to some degree on the political life of the cities "

These are the words I chose. It should be open enough without restricting the merchant guild having too much or too less influence.
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

Post by Hejnewar »

Celtic_Minstrel wrote: April 19th, 2020, 12:56 am I wouldn't expect nomadic dunefolk to be growing crops in general, honestly. There could be exceptions, but I think nomads would mostly obtain grain only by trading. It would be grown along the river, and maybe near some larger oases.
I'm fine with that. Sound good.
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Origin

Post by ghype »

We have been able to consolidate a big chunk of lore with the last pages.

Since we progressed with developing content for a possible mainline campaign which might be a gateway to solving the issue with dunefolk origin, we thought to open up this topic here as well in the hope consolidate that topic as well.

So this is what we suggested in the main post.
Dunefolk Origin
... In one way or another, the dunefolk humans have had to have the same origin as the haldrics people. This how ever could have been many millenia before their golden age. Hence the dunefolk, as much as they know, were ever existing on the great continent and there maybe are legends on how they initially crossed the sea from the east or on foot from the east. Their origin story might go so far back, that it might not be relevant ...
We also have this by Moony where he combines the options of an myth (while not knowing where exactly the dunefolk came from) and an catalytic even being the reason why they forgot it.
Moony's approach
In my campaign, the dunefolk themselves don't know where they came from, despite their effords to uncover their history. They wonder about their origins/identity because of it, but it also causes a sense of 'live the day'/'we live in the present, not past' in their culture.

But there is a darker side to it. They have an uneasy feeling about this prompt lack of history. Their only sources of it are orally transmitted origin myths, which do not differ much in form from ordinary fairytales, and are thus discarded by the scholars of the academies. But the chilling aspect comes with the single common moral that is present in all of them, no matter which of the several hundred tales one picks: That a magical evil inflicted terrible harm on their people and that their ancestors fled far to escape it. The uniformity of them all is enough to convince even open-minded scholars that lifting the taboo on magic may be an invitation for disaster. They don't know what happened or when, but that something was horrific enough to burn itself so heavily into their collective memory.
Celtic and Xalzar supports the idea that it's not unlikely that if there was an catalytic event to have happened in the past, that tracking the past and their heritage might be difficult and lead to the creation of myths.
Celtics Statement
I wouldn't say that sciences are inherently better at tracking history and ancestry than magical pursuits are (in fact, the wizards and necromancers of Wesnoth are probably fairly scientific themselves). If there was some major conflict in their past, with a loss of records or a great exodus, than regardless of their magical and scientific inclinations, it's possible that they might have forgotten many details of their origin.
Xalzar's Statement
If the Dunefolk origins are traumatic and the aftermath a fight for survival, there could be reasons to try to forgot the dark times (or the impossibility to record historical facts during the duress), and history could have been morphed into more epic mythos (with a warning against magic) or handed down orally with ever-growing inaccuracies.
In order to round all this up, I am also gonna quote Yumi from some dm conversations regarding this topic, just to show how all of our thoughts go into the same direction.
Quotes Form Yumi
... for df, do we want to eventually mention anything about their origins or not?
I can agree with that, people do seem to question df origins a lot
I find it strange that the DF wouldn't originate from the south though
I don't see why DF and normal humans have to have a connected origin at all though, they could just be from somewhere different completely
After discussing the reworked mainline lore for the green isle, I tried to come up with something which would explain their origin. This "solution" would be more sort of closure for those who need a practical reason why the Dunefolk are at the south of the great continent, while the Green Isle is the origin of human race.
For that I proposed this, which yumi considers plausible:

The green isles is the origin of the human race. Many hundrets of years - maybe millennia - before the wesfolk war, a group of nomadic people emigrated westwards and arrived on the eastern shores of the great continent. (They might have crossed other island/continents on their way. We are talking about a wandering nomadic tribe over the course of denturies). Wandering deep into the the Great Continent when they eventually arrived after hundred of years on the west shores and settle there.
The other way would be that they emigrated eastwards before haldrics people left the green isle (for other reasons) and arrived at the south western shore of the Great Continent, while Haldrics people arrived centuries or millennia after that at the north western shore of the Great continent.
Say we go on with the theory that they had an catalytic event in their past, which made their heritage untraceable for the better part - then we provided a plausible reason/event for that in the main post which I will mention here again in a more elaborated matter.
Catalytic Event

2000 y ago - or more - (when the dunefolk were mostly only tribes) they had periodic conflict with another faction, which too have the same heritage as the dunefolks, the dunefolk called them the Athvari. The Athvari were used to occupy depths of mountains and caverns scattered in the drylands, where not only encountered dwarfs with time to time - but also discovered magical crystals similarly as the dwarfs. The Athvari remarked the power behing these crystal and embedded them initially only into their weapons and later learned to how to make the crystals emit their magical power and hence cast spells from the runes. The pure joy out of them was not enough for them, so they seeked to dominate other tribes with that newly won power. Greediness over come that Athvari tribes and they tried everything to gain the control over the territories of the remaining tribes. The dwarfs at that point have sealed all their tunnels reaching the Athvari to stay out of this conflict as good as they can. However, the terror the Athvari started spread was getting too big, when the Tribes started to defend themselves, together. One powerful tribe rallied all the remaining tribes against the Athvari tribes and only that way they could merely defend themselves. But it wasn't enough to defeat them. Eventually, the dwarfs too started to get involved in this conflict as they would fear that the Athvari might return and seek more of these crystal and would breach into the dwarven Clans to get them. An alliance between the dwarves and the duenfolk tribes against the Athvari ensured that something like this would not occur again. From that point on. The dwarves felt responsible for the runes and the power that hides in them and protected these artefact as good as they could until this are of rune magic eventually got lost over centuries. With the Athvari defeated, the dunefolk could start developing into what they are today. They realised that they can support each other and benefit far more a lot if they work together. That way the first dunefolk communities were formed, which developed into the cities we know of 2day.
This origin story would also neatly explain why the Dunefolk's mistrust regarding the use magic. Yumi also considered this could work depending on what origin story we choose for dunefolk. And it also perfectly fits the events in one of the proposed stories for a dunefolk campaign on how it could be exposed to the player. Here I will link to this.



In Summary:
  • Dunefolk originate from the Green Isle just as much Haldric does, but that was many centuries before the wesfolk wars and hence irrelevant
  • Dunefolk eventually arrived at the Great Continent, it took them some time where. Eventually settled in the southern hemisphere of the Western Great Continent
  • Since this "exodus" could be considered ancient, it was not documented due to nomadic lifestyle and is references in mythical type of stories
  • A certain part of the emigrated tribes (the athvari) found the use of runic power, which they used to dominate the remaining tribes
  • devastating and chaotic wars broke out, an alliance between the Dwarfs and remaining tribes defeated the athvari
  • at that moment the remaining tribes developed into the Dunefolk we know of 2day
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

Post by max_torch »

Just want to point out that this talk about Dunefolk fighting with Athvari and somehow it ends up with a ban on magic has a parallel in Warhammer 40,000.

In the Warhammer 40,000 setting there is a period called "The Cybernetic Revolt" wherein AI starts rebelling against humans leading to a great long war. The humans eventually win but as a result of the war the humans decide to ban all AI and also ban significant development of technology which is why mankind remains in almost the same level of technology for several millennia. By the way these AI were called "Men of Iron"
In the case of Dunefolk instead of AI it's magic.
Random suggestion: This conflict could be the reason why the Dunefolks land is desolate and barren and desert. The war destroyed the land.

Warhammer 40K wiki article - https://warhammer40k.fandom.com/wiki/Men_of_Iron
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

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max_torch wrote: April 24th, 2020, 9:01 am Random suggestion: This conflict could be the reason why the Dunefolks land is desolate and barren and desert. The war destroyed the land.
We already mentioned that the extension of the war would result in the expansion of the deserts.
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Origin

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ghype wrote: April 23rd, 2020, 1:48 pm In Summary:
  • Dunefolk originate from the Green Isle just as much Haldric does, but that was many centuries before the wesfolk wars and hence irrelevant
  • Dunefolk eventually arrived at the Great Continent, it took them some time where. Eventually settled in the southern hemisphere of the Western Great Continent
  • Since this "exodus" could be considered ancient, it was not documented due to nomadic lifestyle and is references in mythical type of stories
  • A certain part of the emigrated tribes (the athvari) found the use of runic power, which they used to dominate the remaining tribes
  • devastating and chaotic wars broke out, an alliance between the Dwarfs and remaining tribes defeated the athvari
  • at that moment the remaining tribes developed into the Dunefolk we know of 2day
An annotation about the Green Isle: unless it is being changed (I heard rumors about a Rise of Wesnoth update), it is not the place of origin of humans. They come from the West, and colonized the island (first the Islefolk then the Wesfolk).
Unless you mean that Islefolk departed from the island and colonized the southern parts of the Great Continent...but then there is this:
Timeline of Wesnoth wrote:12 BW: The Crown Prince of Southbay discovers the Great Continent.
Word of God says he's the first to discover the continent.

I'm all of the Athvari storyline since we have units already made for them and they are interesting, just let's have them survive somewhere somehow to keep the possibility of conflicts in the current timeline.
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Origin

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Xalzar wrote: April 24th, 2020, 6:15 pm An annotation about the Green Isle: unless it is being changed (I heard rumors about a Rise of Wesnoth update), it is not the place of origin of humans. They come from the West, and colonized the island (first the Islefolk then the Wesfolk).
Unless you mean that Islefolk departed from the island and colonized the southern parts of the Great Continent...but then there is this:
Timeline of Wesnoth wrote:12 BW: The Crown Prince of Southbay discovers the Great Continent.
Word of God says he's the first to discover the continent.
As far my knowledge goes, that is subject for change. It was discussed in developers discussion.
Xalzar wrote: April 24th, 2020, 6:15 pm I'm all of the Athvari storyline since we have units already made for them and they are interesting, just let's have them survive somewhere somehow to keep the possibility of conflicts in the current timeline.
I don 't see know wether we get to see those sprites in that context. I might reuse those sprites but yeah.
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

Post by Celtic_Minstrel »

I don't know anything about these Athvari… are they humans? I'm not sure we need a third human faction (though despite that I still like the Aragwaith).
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

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Celtic_Minstrel wrote: April 24th, 2020, 11:18 pm I don't know anything about these Athvari… are they humans? I'm not sure we need a third human faction (though despite that I still like the Aragwaith).
The Athvari is just that mythical faction that would be considered a sub-faction of the dunefolk (as they have the same heritage). They are basically just tribes (before the dunefolk were called dunefolk) that abused the power of the runes. Similarly how the ancient lich lords did their secret things but never appear in mainline events (because its ancient), the athvari would be categorised the same. You know they existed, you know they did stuff but they are long gone. So the Athvari wouldn't even appear in the campaigns unless some one makes an UMC campaign about the war they had.
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

Post by Kwandulin »

Are we talking about the same Athvari? In OoA they are different, so we might want to change their name.

In OoA:
- The Athvari are a smaller group of beings that are not related to the dunefolk (although both live in the deserts).
- Both dunefolk and Athvari are able to cast magic. Athvari are excellent magic users, though.
- One time in history due to special circumstances, instead of chosing a "king", the three city states Th'arwya, Serrul and Kesh each send a "king" to rule in the capitol city of Kthar. These were then known as the three kings.
- The three kings then wanted to consolidate their power and used their magical powers and their united armies to overthrow any foe. The three kings used dark magic.
- The reign of terror lasted for some years.
- The first of the Athvari created the Sphere, a giant magical construct with great powers. It is a magical prison, from which one cannot cast magic.
- The Athvari put the three kings in the Sphere and ended their reign.
- Due to their great losses, the Athvari swore, that they would not allow any magic in their lands. Magic would entice people to do bad things.
- The Athvari can sense magic and can teleport. So they hunt down any magic users. They are drawn to magic like moths to the flame.
- Over the course of the years, the knowledge about magic dimished in the population of the dunefolk.
- The Athvari are a small group of beings. Sometimes, Athvari are lured in by magic users and killed. The power of the Athvari diminishes slowly.
- The Sphere broke lose of the control of the Athvari and led to random magical events in the lands. It poses a constant threat.
- The Athvari live on the high rocks of Isanbar. This is the small spot in the Sandy Wastes.
- Often, Athvari are consultants of kings. Athvari are respected by most people.
Spoiler:
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

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Kwandulin wrote: April 25th, 2020, 9:42 am Are we talking about the same Athvari? In OoA they are different, so we might want to change their name.
sure. yeah, i used it as a placeholder anyway. The dunefolk related sub faction i was talking about could have any other name.

Kwandulin wrote: April 25th, 2020, 9:42 amIn OoA:
While I find your campaing amazing, the premise that the dunefolk can use magic in your campaign makes it hard to fit in current dunefolk lore.
Other than that, your campaign is basically about such an cataclysmic event i was talking in my origin story. However, outsourcing the ban and mistrust of magic to a faction that is not dunefolk would seem odd. Like, the athvari are the only reason that the dunefolk cannot use magic? And hence the knoweledge dissapears?

With that in mind, the athvari basically "took over" the dunefolk and made them theirs. I don't know if making dunefolk being subjugated by athvari is right call for mainline, it almost sounds like orcs and undead.
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

Post by Celtic_Minstrel »

The OoA scenario seems really unsustainable. The Athvari are painted almost as a magic cult who want to keep the knowledge of magic to themselves; obviously their motivation isn't power, but that's still the effect of it. I think such a setup would more likely breed resentment and lead to dunefolk studying magic in secret… which from the sounds of it is exactly what happened in the scenario, given that many mages were imprisoned in the sphere.

(Mind you, I doubt there is any scenario in which there would not be any dunefolk who study magic in secret.)

Rather than having an external cult-like faction enforcing a ban on magic, it should be the dunefolk themselves, at all levels of government (national, municipal, tribal), and in particular it needs to be more than just "you can't do this". If you tell people they can't do something, some of them will inevitably do it. With just a straightforward ban and no lore surrounding it, mages would probably be somewhat common in the criminal underworld. Rather than simply banning it, they must emphasize the danger of magic, effectively spreading fear of its power. It's probably also necessary to identify the chief things that people used to use magic for and develop alternative non-magic ways of doing those things.

I have a feeling that extended contact with other races would tend to weaken dunefolk views on the danger of magic… so their relations with the more magic-using races (particularly elves and the humans of Wesnoth, as well as possibly merfolk) shouldn't be more than basic trading relations. If they're just trading, they probably won't meet any magic-using individuals (particularly since the other nations surely know of the dunefolk ban on magic), and there's a low chance of the topic of magic coming up. They can have closer relations to races or nations that don't use magic, like nagas, drakes, trolls, or dwarves. (I omitted saurians and orcs because I'm not quite sure where they stand on magic, but I suspect the oracles and shamans would barely qualify as mages.)
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

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Celtic_Minstrel wrote: April 25th, 2020, 2:44 pm ...extended contact with other races would tend to weaken dunefolk views on the danger of magic… so their relations with the more magic-using races (particularly elves and the humans of Wesnoth, as well as possibly merfolk) shouldn't be more than basic trading relations. If they're just trading, they probably won't meet any magic-using individuals (particularly since the other nations surely know of the dunefolk ban on magic), and there's a low chance of the topic of magic coming up. They can have closer relations to races or nations that don't use magic, like nagas, drakes, trolls, or dwarves. (I omitted saurians and orcs because I'm not quite sure where they stand on magic, but I suspect the oracles and shamans would barely qualify as mages.)
This is well written. will keep notes on that on the main pos.
Celtic_Minstrel wrote: April 25th, 2020, 2:44 pm Rather than simply banning it, they must emphasize the danger of magic, effectively spreading fear of its power.
The scenario i depicted in my cataclysmic dispute between the dunefolks and the sub faction (what ever they may be called if not athvari) is a good start on showing the danger of magic. For that to have long time effect on the dunefolks, they should have been able to either remember or document that events to some degree, to being able talk about those exact danger of magic.

I would opt for the way that the dunefolk luminaries might have knowledge to some degree of the exact events of that cataclysmic war in the past, but they lack of proof or detailed documentation. That's what why it could be cool to have the a campaign where, which is designed as treasure hunt quest, but develops into something bigger while they find scripts about said cataclysmic war.
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

Post by Celtic_Minstrel »

The cataclysmic dispute that soured the dunefolk on magic has probably faded into myth. There are no doubt a plethora of tall tales and conflicting stories of what exactly happened, and there may be some fragmentary historical records, but no-one knows the exact details.
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Re: Dunefolk Lore - Consolidation

Post by ghype »

OK so here is my attempt to consolidate the more recent comments regarding Dunefolks Pre-History, Origin and their use of magic.

Pre-History

note: this is mere context for Lore and Wiki. Not any of this is planned to be explored in mainline campaigns. Any of this may also be altered according to the Mainline Campaign/Lore rework currently happening if need and will not affect Dunefolk Origin or the background in their mistrust of magic.



The green isles is the origin of the human race. Many hundrets of years - maybe millennia - before the wesfolk war, a group of nomadic people emigrated westwards and arrived on the eastern shores of the great continent. (They might have crossed other island/continents on their way. We are talking about a wandering nomadic tribe over the course of denturies). Wandering deep into the the Great Continent when they eventually arrived after hundred of years on the west shores and settle there.
The other way would be that they emigrated eastwards before haldrics people left the green isle (for other reasons) and arrived at the south western shore of the Great Continent, while Haldrics people arrived centuries or millennia after that at the north western shore of the Great continent.

Origin

2000 y ago - or more - (when the dunefolk were mostly only tribes) they had periodic conflict with renegade tribes, which may be called dunefolk too as the other they have the same heritage. The dunefolk called them the Athvari (- this is a Placeholder until we find a more suitable name as this one is borrowed form Kwandulins OoA).
The Athvari were used to occupy depths of mountains and caverns scattered in the drylands, where not only encountered dwarfs with time to time - but also discovered magical crystals similarly as the dwarfs. The Athvari remarked the power behing these crystal and embedded them initially only into their weapons and later learned to how to make the crystals emit their magical power and hence cast spells from the runes. The pure joy out of them was not enough for them, so they seeked to dominate other tribes with that newly won power. Greediness over come that Athvari tribes and they tried everything to gain the control over the territories of the remaining tribes. The dwarfs at that point have sealed all their tunnels reaching the Athvari to stay out of this conflict as good as they can. However, the terror the Athvari started spread was getting too big, when the Tribes started to defend themselves, together. One powerful tribe rallied all the remaining tribes against the Athvari tribes and only that way they could merely defend themselves. But it wasn't enough to defeat them. Eventually, the dwarfs too started to get involved in this conflict as they would fear that the Athvari might return and seek more of these crystal and would breach into the dwarven Clans to get them. An alliance between the dwarves and the duenfolk tribes against the Athvari ensured that something like this would not occur again. From that point on. The dwarves felt responsible for the runes and the power that hides in them and protected these artefact as good as they could until this are of rune magic eventually got lost over centuries. With the Athvari defeated, the dunefolk could start developing into what they are today. They realised that they can support each other and benefit far more a lot if they work together. That way the first dunefolk communities were formed, which developed into the cities we know of 2day.

The aftermath of the wars between the dunefolk and the renegade tribes were devastating. These wars took place on the southern side of the cloud bay which once were open fields or dry grasslands. But once the wars were over the landscaped changed. Plants and wildlife were destroyed and certainly enough, the small dunes around the bays sure expanded southways into the mainland and over after centuries it became the ashland desert the dunefolk are inhabiting today.

The cataclysmic dispute that soured the dunefolk on magic has probably faded into myth. There are no doubt a plethora of tall tales and conflicting stories of what exactly happened, and there may be some fragmentary historical records, but no-one knows the exact details.

Dunefolk's mistrust towards Magic

Looking back, the Dunefolk may have understood the risk of unwanted consequences in the use of magic, and decided to go for the empirical and rational way of thinking.The dunefolk themselves, at all levels of government (national, municipal, tribal) emphasised the danger of magic from that time on, effectively spreading fear of its power. It's probably also necessary to identify the chief things that people used to use magic for and develop alternative non-magic ways of doing those things. The uniformity of them all is enough to convince even open-minded scholars that lifting the taboo on magic may be an invitation for disaster.

After these wars, the Luminary had time to reflect on the happenings and developed philosophies are still thought and discussed until to this day . It sounds like this:


Four elemental forces that each bleed through into the 'material plane'.

_____________The Sun_____________
________The Seas -- The Winds______
____________The Deeps____________

The Sun bleeds through and creates the scorched deserts.
The Seas bleed through and create the fertile coasts and river valleys.
The Winds bleed through and create the windswept highlands.
The Deeps bleed through and create the mineral-rich underground.

The Aether has been suggested by some Dunefolk scholars as a fifth 'elemental force' that bleeds through into the 'material plane'. Rather than bleeding through into one environment, the Aether bleeds through throughout the world, granting the sentient species of Irdya the power to harness magic; however, it also leads to the creation of unnatural abominations - most particularly, ghosts.

This is not a widely-accepted theory. Rather, magic is seen as an unnatural force outside of the 'great circle', and is therefore generally feared and even hated.

Cultists would subscribe to the theory that Aether is an 'elemental force', and so would want to bring it into their conception of the 'great circle' and harness its power, much as the Dunefolk are willing to harness fertile lands and valuable metals.

The Luminaries would subscribe to the theory that Aether is a corruption, and so would want to keep it outlawed.


I will consider them consolidated for the moment, if no one has to add to this summary
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