Kobold King

Request granted! I call it, Red and Blue Drulgas On and Under an Ice Floe.

Looking forward to it. In the meantime, here's my own attempt at artistically depicting the Ice Kin! Anyone else need their creations drawn?

I assume she regularly goes up against Tyrant Guy?

Which in this case, is not a bad thing. I imagined that they might fill the same role to the drulgas as wolves or bears have filled for us. They'd be feared predators, probably either revered or reviled in myths and legends, but they wouldn't be dangerous enough to severely impact their way of life or threaten them as a species. I thought you might. Absolutely fine. And that idea sounds awesome. Ooh, neat! Out of curiosity, why do they have the ability to breathe underwater? Do they often dwell in aquatic habitats? Are their water-breathing and bone-claw abilities purely biological, or do they make extensive use of lumuoles?

I'm almost out of that Nancy Boy™ hair gel I love so much!

That's kind of a bummer, since I kind of want to see that. Wanna give us a hint about what kind of species lives in your mountains? Humans, Dromeans, Rachnyx, or something else entirely?

That works for me. Dromeans and Rachnyx have been around for many millennia longer, though, so they should either be ahead of humans or have their own timeline. In any case, here are some new tundra animals! Snowsaber (Cryokopisaurus) There are certainly mammalian predators on Diaemus, but in many places they are overshadowed by the great carnivorous dinosaurs. Towering bodies, enormous skulls, and banana-sized fangs characterize this group, and they have (presumably) colonized many distinct habitats. In the frozen snow fields of the tundra, one such predator, the snowsaber, reigns supreme. This beast is forty feet long and weighs over a ton, and its roar is a note of terror for many polar species. Theropod dinosaurs usually have short arms and walk upon two legs. The snowsaber has long since evolved past that. The arms of the snowsaber are almost as long and powerful as the legs, and the animal frequently bounds on all fours when covering distance. Its scales are shielded by the cold by a coat of shaggy ivory feathers, and the jaws are fringed with colonies of blue lumuoles bright enough to blend in with the pure white landscape of the winter tundra. In summer, when the tundra turns green, the snowsaber molts and gains a auburn coat, and the jaw lumuoles turn deep navy as the males attempt to attract females. The naming characteristic of the snowsaber is the pair of lethal saber-shaped fangs at the front of the mouth, visible even when the animal's mouth is closed. The teeth are curved and fulfill the same function they did for the saber-toothed cats of Earth--killing. When hunting the snowsaber will ambush its prey, bounding to its side and using its powerful front forelegs to wrestle and pin it to the ground. Once the unfortunate megafauna is fully helpless, the snowsaber will swiftly sever its jugular veins with a bite to the throat, allowing the animal to bleed out in the snow before digging in to the carcass. Because of the delicate saber teeth in the front, the snowsaber must be cautious when eating and hunting. Small and bony prey like humans are generally shunned, in favor of large beefy herbivores like spaksnouts and the few other iguanadonts of the tundra. Humans nonetheless must fear the young of the snowsaber, which will happily prey on humans and other small game before their fangs grow in. And snowsabers of all ages will be a serious threat to any people who rely on large livestock to secure their sustenance on the frozen plains. Scuzzard (Erythopterus) Snowsabers, because of their teeth, have difficulty making use of an entire prey animal and often leave the remnants of the carcass lying out in the open. In addition, large animals from the sea regularly wash up upon the coastline, and make for an easy meal for scavengers. The tundra's resident scavenger is the scuzzard, the pterosaur equivalent to the avian vulture. Any meat left exposed to the elements with quickly assemble a throng of these condor-sized pterodactyls. They are covered in thick silver hair except for their wings, which are also hairy but also blink dark red from red lumuole colonies that take up residence there. The lumuoles generate something like a thermal air current in flight, allowing the pterosaur to glide with ease across the frigid landscape. The scuzzard is magnificently adapted to its chosen habitat. A keen sense of smell allows the animal to smell an animal the moment it keels over; a dark, semi-transparent membrane can be closed over the eyes at will, filtering out snowglare but allowing the pterosaur to spot a dead animal from high in the sky. Finally, scuzzards have extremely thick, sharp beaks that are perfect for ripping into the hides of dead dinosaurs, exposing the cold flesh within. Once meat has reached the digestive system, part of it remains fermenting in the stomach acid for weeks on end. This is not an inefficiency in the animal; this is a defense mechanism. If a small predator threatens the scuzzard, the red-winged pterodactyl will open its beak wide and let loose a barrage of steamy projectile vomit, in some species heated to dangerous degrees by extra lumuole colonies in the stomach. This deters 99% of all the predators a scuzzard is likely to face, and is often used in displays for females during the breeding season. The scuzzard may be the only life form on Diaemus that doesn't see anything gross about this. And now, here's the first marine critter I've designed, like I promised Twi. (Also, I would like to propose that we name the cold body of water around the south pole "The Twilight Ocean." In-universe because of the faint amount of sunlight that makes its way to the south pole, and out-of-universe because of the obvious meta joke. ) Pliod (Kardosaurus) At first glance, one might confuse a pliod with a huge crocodile with flippers for legs, with a dark black back and a tan underbelly. The pliod rather belongs to the pliosaur family, and is one of the more savage predators of the Twilight Ocean. Pliods are antisocial creatures, which nonetheless share a lot of beach space as they wallow on the shore in between hunts. They maintain fiercely defended personal space, and it's not uncommon for angry bull pliods to rip each other's faces off over choice patches of turf. In the water they become fearsome and deadly carnivores, capable of catching and eating practically anything smaller than themselves. (And for a Volkswagen-sized predator, this means that animals a pliod can't eat are few and far between. Blue lumuole colonies flow through the animal's body, preventing its blood from freezing in the ice-cold water. They are acquired through dietary means, as most polar fish use the lumuoles for the same purpose. "Hotspots" are extremely numerous in this ocean, and pliods rarely find themselves in the position of having malnourished lumuoles. To TwiLyght: I created the pliods solely to serve as a nemesis to the drulgas. Pliods would hunt and kill drulgas whenever they're given the opportunity, and since beaches that are also lumuole hotspots may not be in abundance, they could easily wind up clashing over magical floor space. If you'd rather the drulgas be the apex predators of their environment, I can easily replace the pliods with a completely aquatic supercarnivore that lives in deep waters far away from the shores. Your wish is my command. I have a few more marine critter ideas, including ocean-going pterosaurs and a giant ammonite found in deep southern waters. To everyone else, if you'd like some help designing Mesozoic-appropriate wildlife for your region, I'd be overjoyed to help.

On the contrary, it makes a lot of sense. The continents we have thus far are huge, comparable to Asia in size. Asia has historically been home to great empires, primitive tribes, and remote isolated kingdoms all at the same time, with no overlapping borders or disputed territories. There could be many different levels of technological advancement. With that said, here are some things I've established thus far: Humans arrived on Diaemus a little over ten thousand years ago. All human cultures and societies currently on the planet have dispersed since that time. The Rachnyx and the Dromeans had been around for over a million years already, but apart from a few long-lost civilizations, these were primarily Stone Age primitives. Bronze casting was well-known to at least some Dromean cultures one thousand years ago. It remains undetermined whether steel was commonplace anywhere by this time, but it is certainly available to sufficiently advanced cultures today. At least one civilization (the Ice Kin) have learned how to use blue lumuoles for cheap and efficient hydropower, suggesting that water wheels and other mechanisms might also be available. Personally, if I had to guess I'd say that a Greco-Roman level of technology is probably about as advanced as it goes on the prime continent of Diaemus. However, there aren't any hard limits right now, and there could be some very advanced folks living up in Edgedancer's mountains or in some other region we don't know much about.

So it'll be like the British Empire of our world--hot news a couple hundred years ago, but nowadays it's shrunk dramatically and gets overshadowed by bigger powers? If I may gesture to the part of the new coast I would like: Maybe Twi's coastals could be found on the far coast of the western bay? Also, for anyone confused by the Koppen classification colors, here's our dear world of Earth rendered in the same colors:

Aww. Looking forward to reading what you come up with, though. How "ancient" are we talking about? A thousand years old? Ten thousand years old? A fossilized empire that ruled a million years previously?

Thanks. I'm working on Queen Tryphezia's time now, and then I'll get straight to explaining the modern Ice Kin. The modern ones don't always live up to the ideals of harmony and tolerance that founded their first settlement. If your people didn't possess metal working capabilities, then there'd be absolutely no conflict at all. In fact, if you wanted a tribal society that uses metal tools, I could even work in that the Dromean colonists traded with them too in that early century, and continue to do so in the modern day. There were a few tundra folk clans who could be pretty nasty when they felt threatened, but all things considered they were remarkably benign. If your people are peaceful, then they'd almost certainly be allowed to live in peace.

Can I answer that question with an epic-length essay? This is what I've written on Ice Kin history so far. I was going to hold off on posting it until I had the full description of their modern-day culture and society done, but since I doubt anyone would read this whole thing in one sitting, I might as well tell you what I've planned out so far. Note: as I believe the length of the Diaemian year and month is still in flux, I am referring to Ice Kin history in terms of human years. Once concrete values for the calendar have been established, these numbers will be properly converted. And now, without further ado... History: Ancient Tribes and Founding The first Dromean wanderers arrived on the tundra thirty thousand years before the current date, millennia before the arrival of humanity to Diaemus and the founding of most Dromean civilizations. These were primitive folk. They let their claws grow long and pointed as they followed herds of prey animals across the plains, screeching their songs and passing them down from generation to generation. The tundra folk ate a diet rich in blue lumuoles, which adapted to their bodies in subtle ways. They could prevent their blood from freezing even in the most frigid blizzards, and they could perform a passive sculpting of water around them that allowed them to keep their footing in the deepest snow and the slickest ice. They were animists who believed that lumuoles were doorways into the spirit world; those with an especially high affinity to the organisms were either revered as shamans or driven out as witches, depending on their actions. Over the years Diaemus changed. Empires rose and empires fell. The boundaries of nations warped and moved. The Rachnyx emerged as a credible civilization, and for the first humans set foot on the continent. Things scarcely changed for the tundra folk, though. Their culture remained virtually unchanged for thousands of years, as few foreign powers had any interest in the frosty wasteland they called home. (It remains a point of contention among scholars whether or not the tundra folk were aware of the human-drulga culture that came to exist on the southernmost coast. Like many Dromeans the tundra dwellers had a xenophobic streak, and the fact that the modern coastals live hundreds of miles from the tundra folk's primary hunting grounds suggests the raptors kept their distance from the humans and the seals, or vice versa.) The tundra dwellers resisted many attempts at integrating them into northern Dromean cultures, but their isolationism and disinterested stance on civilization began to change nine hundred years before the present day. Nine hundred years ago, a counter-culture began to make motions among various Dromean civilizations in the north. (Most of these civilizations are no longer present in the modern world.) This movement was characterized by liberal ideologies, a progressively secular view of religion, and an emphasis on the pursuit of what knowledge the world had to offer. The movement was small and focused largely on pariah packs, who became increasingly estranged from their surrounding neighbors. Small communes began to spring up nestled in the forests and deserts of the north, but after the destruction of several by angry pyrokinetic crusaders, the largest coalition of the progressive packs began to turn its collective eyes south. Bold Dromeans from all corners of the continent began working their way south in search of suitable habitat. They sought somewhere isolated, a place where they could live and research away from the hopeless savages that inhabited the rest of the known world. With ancient maps and sketchy surveys, they located a mountain range in the distant south with decent alpine life and a climate that was almost but not quite mildly hospitable. Most importantly, there were plenty of tales of a large lumuole hotspot on an inaccessible mountain slope. True, many Dromean, human, and even Rachnyx lives had been lost in the dream of colonizing the cold mountain over the years, but the Ice Kin's ancestors were brave and filled with zeal. Many died on the journey south due to disease and questionable mountaineering skills. Upon reaching their destination, even more began to suffer the wages of starvation, and the first winter of the settlement killed hundreds. The simple fact of the matter was that the assembled Dromeans were unequipped and uninformed for the hardships of montane existence, and their resources were too thin for a desperate retreat back into the northern territories. More and more Dromeans lost their lives, with most of the survivors being the ones who had assimilated colonies of blue or red lumuoles into their bodies from their diets. These ones were able to halt the slow death of freezing, and by, with difficulty, extending their powers to a few neighbors, were able to trade for enough sustenance to scrape by. In desperation, scouts were sent even further south to survey the tundra, to determine whether conditions for survival were more hospitable on the plains. The scouts found pathways down from the mountains and onto the flat tundra, where they swiftly caught the trail of great herds of spaksnouts and other large herbivores. Following the tracks they found in the frozen mud, they encountered a roving band of the tundra dwellers, who promptly attempted to kill them. The scouts spent a harrowing few weeks attempting to survive in the wasteland, hounded by the native Dromeans who were intent on protecting their herds from what they saw as marauding settlers. A handful of deaths occurred on both sides, but ultimately the colonist scouts managed to work out a trade: simple metal tools in exchange for access to the prey herds. This was pleasing to the tundra folk, who had never had access to metal blades before, and the beginnings of coexistence began to be formed. For the next century, the colonists and the tundra folk began to reach a cross-cultural understanding. The colonists began to carve out an existence in simple shacks and natural caves at the base of the mountains, while the tundra folk began drawing closer to the mountains to trade meat and animal hides for the metal tools being produced by the settlers. Some colonists began to migrate onto the tundra to learn how to herd spaksnouts. Some natives began to move into the nascent city to learn how to smelt metal. Before long, young males and females on both sides started coupling, and a mixed-race, fully integrated community began to develop at the base of the freezing mountains, miles and miles from the nearest civilization. But they were not the Ice Kin yet. History: Queen Tryphezia [DATA WITHHELD] As you can see, a major factor in the tundra folk / colonist integration was the knowledge of bronze casting on behalf of the colonists. Bronze was something the tundra folk hadn't seen before in my timeline, but if there was already a kingdom there that could make it--or worse, a kingdom that could smelt iron into steel--then they'd likely have forged an alliance with those guys instead and left the colonists to freeze to death at the foot of that mountain. Like McKeedee pointed out, it's not exactly common for a tribal, nomadic people to learn the secret of metalcasting on their own. (Even the Huns under Attila couldn't do it by some accounts--they had to strip metal weapons off of dead enemies, or else make do with stone or wooden tools.) That said, if you would like to create an incredibly ancient steel-forging empire on the northern tundra, I can probably find a way to make everything fit. The last thing I want to do is stifle anyone's creativity for my own selfish plans.

The Ice Kin arrived in the tundra nine hundred Earth-years before the current date, so if a metalworking civilization arrived sometime within the later half of the last millennium, it wouldn't wreak havoc at all with my constructed history. It would actually be kind of nice for the Ice Kin to have newer neighbors that are closer to their level than the coastals. If you want to have an ancient advanced kingdom on the tundra though, I can probably find a way to work that in. (As long as they weren't too aggressively expansionist.)

* gasp * Another polar buddy! I have to ask though, how old and advanced would these new tundra-dwellers be? I've been confidently writing up the history of the Ice Kin with the assumption that there were no other factions in the area with the ability to smelt metals or sustain agriculture in the ice. This might require substantial re-writes.

A random note to any lurkers who are unsure of what to do with their land holdings. At this point, I don't believe anyone has called dibs on a deep jungle infested with sickly green lumuoles, which mutate anything they touch into a shambling undead abomination intent on spilling out of the forest and devouring living flesh. Just a thought.

Here's one of her early masterpieces, Homeland of the Drurgas.

Looks great to me! Well, I like the idea. It would definitely help make the Dromeans more alien and distinct from the humans. That said, I don't think that a seasonal breeding model really works for the Dromeans. A true mating season is strongly related to the length of the day and the local climate; the Dromeans, being a species that stretches from the seasonally extreme savannas of the north all the way down to the frozen tundra of the south, would see their breeding cycle interrupted and distorted in new regions. Instead, I would propose opportunistic breeding, distinct from seasonal breeding but also from the continuous breeding model that we humans follow. In opportunistic breeding, females become more receptive not when the time of year changes, but at any time when food is abundant and the temperature is suitable. Opportunistic breeding could result in an effective "mating season" in empires like the Sorukaan, as the resources available to the females would repeat on the same cycle every year. (In nature, the difference between seasonal and opportunistic breeders is almost impossible to determine around the equator.) However, opportunistic breeding would allow creators like myself freedom to design Dromean cultures without being confined to set breeding seasons. Hope that makes sense.

Do you know how she'd react to having a strong craving for Cocoa Puffs, only to find that all the local supermarkets only have Fruit Loops?

I adore Nutella, but I have too little self control to allow myself to have any. If I snapped even once, I'd look like Exel by the end of the month.

Oh. Ah, so we have a case of mutual contempt then. Much better than war, at least. The earliest Dromeans to visit the tundra, after a failed drurga hunt:

I steal a lot of names from Latin, myself, typically garbled just enough to be more-or-less unique. Also, behold the greatest warrior of all Diaemus! I like that. Personally I think it would be best if you went with either drudge or drurga for both, though, just to stay consistent. I think for the most part the Ice Kin and the coastals will remain pretty distant from each other, so reserved hospitality sounds reasonable. As for the tapestry: the Noble Packs treat hunts like other races treat formal balls or dinners. They're not really interested in a fair fight or competition, for the most part--the preferred targets are animals rounded up and injured in advance, for an easy kill by one of the Nobles. Fortunately they consider the hunting of sapients to be barbaric, so unless early Ice Kin weren't aware of the water drurga's level of awareness, and unless there was an injured drurga incapable of escaping from a pack of morbidly obese raptors in a sled, seal skin luxuries probably won't be available to them.

They could call it bloodsight, since it allows them to "see" the warm blood in other living things? Hmm... maybe "drurga" could be the name of both races, with an adjective specifying which group is being discussed. Red drurgas could be humans because of their lumuoles, while blue drurgas would be the seals. Something like that. The Ice Kin tend to be a... pompous, decadent lot. There are many scholars among them, but the majority of these remain holed up in the ice cities, studying magic and discovering new uses of lumuoles. Biologists and anthropologists would exist, but be relatively uncommon and probably more focused on the northern civilizations. The Ice Kin are the kind of people who are only really interested in those they consider their equals, and for the most part they'd look down on the "coastals." That said, there would be occasional visitors to their villages. Merchant caravans might come with a handful of curious scholars fascinated by the coastal peoples' harmony and communion, and I could see beautiful friendships forming between humans, seals, and raptors. On the other hand, at least one wealthy head of a Noble Pack probably has a century-old sapient seal-skin tapestry hanging on his wall, so it evens out.

YES

Looking forward to it! The awesomeness is expanding too quickly for me to keep up. Well, why don't you draw the Dromeans and Rachnyx? They're the common "stock races" of this world, so it'd be pretty cool to have a visual representation of them. I like that. It would definitely be a blue lumuole-connected power, and blue lumuoles are in great abundance in this part of the world. Ooh! Since these are magic, could they create a supercavitation bubble around themselves to greatly accelerate their speed underwater? (If you're not in the know, a supercavitation bubble is a "bubble" of air or vacuum used to reduce friction and drag on an underwater surface.) Also, if you're still wanting suggestions for names, how about "drurgas" for the seal-people?

Well... I suppose you could always start a short, more serious WHOOC...