Player Primer

The World

Lorgaire is the center of the universe. In a literal physical sense, the sun, moons, and stars revolve around Lorgaire, and in a metaphysical sense the other planes of existence are spawned off of and tethered to Lorgaire, The First World. For the powers of good and evil to battle eachother, they must do so by passing through the first world to reach their archrivals, often via magical portals of varying sizes. These portals may be tiny fissures allowing only a single spy, or scout, or cantrip to pass into Lorgaire, or huge rifts through which whole armies and epic miracles are pour forth when Circumstance allows.   All the multitude of outer planes interact with the first world and other places this way, and the people of Lorgaire know they are only pawns or obstacles in the wars waged by the immense powers of the outer worlds. Without a force such as the ancient ogres who ruled over all, and dominated with unfathomable magics, there is little to protect them from the machinations of these alien entities.  

Magic and Technology

Magic is everywhere, but minor in scope and power today. Physical evidence and tales of great deeds passed down by the long lived races indicate this was not always the case -- there were once many nigh-godlike mages among the ogres who literally imagined other races like the elves and dwarves into existence to serve them. A great Cataclysm occurred that brought low the empires of the ogres and changed the way magic worked.   Many thousands of years have passed since the Cataclysm, with the races vying for control and influnce, nations and cultures rising and falling again -- both to wars amongs them selves and against the powers of the outer worlds and planes of existence. Most societies operate with a dark-ages level of technology and social institutions, supplemented with common but weak magic to live an early medieval existence -- with a few more sophisticated exceptions here or there that have lingered on from ages past, or been rediscovered.  

Sapient Species

Most of the classic races of fantasy roleplay are present in Lorgaire, elves, dwarves and humans, and in the background some orcs, halflings and ogres. The relationships they have to one another are different however, and lean into concepts of divergent evolution to explain the wide array of fantastic races. Mechanically this means an 'species'-bane weapon works against the family of races:  

• Ogres are the trunk of a family including
• ogres, many different castes (subtypes), the progenitor race that started the paths of all listed below
• humans, a caste of ogres predominantly broken free of their collective society
• giants, clans of ogres warped by war against one another
• goblinoids, including goblins, bugbears, hobgoblins; humans warped by fiendish outsider powers

 

• Elves are the trunk of a family including
• elves, many different clans (subtypes)
• vampires, warped by the elves lust to regain immortality
• trolls, warped by the elves lust to regain immortality
• Orcs, warped by the elves lust to regain immortality

 

• Dwarves are the trunk of a family including
• dwarves, many different clans (subtypes)
• halflings, warped in service of the dwarves wars
• gnomes, warped in service of the dwarves wars

  Because the forces at hand creating these divergent events are often antagonistic, manipulative, or outright desructive, the prevailing sentiment is frequently not welcoming of these changes or oddities -- with perhaps the exception of the dwarves and their subraces. The people of Lorgaire are in a war for their own survival, and distrust the unfamiliar or unusual as a sign of the real threats against them by outside powers wishing to use them in their struggles against mortal enemies.  

Factions

Play will begin in the regions of some of humans greatest current nations: in the north The Gold Coast and in the southeast King's Bay of the western continent Eirghar.