Malveron

The World - Malveron is a world of similar size as planet Earth, yet has only one continent. It stretches from frozen, dark wastes in the north, to the golden, sun-torched deserts of Zun in the south. In the very center of the continent sits The Cursed Lands. These were once known as the "heartlands" and were the core of a world-spanning empire, now remembered as "The Old Empire". This empire encompassed all humanity and spanned from the western to the eastern coasts of the world, controlling a hefty 70% of Malveron.

Humanity - Unfortunately for humanity and their empire, a great apocalyptic event took place, just over 900 years ago. This "Great Devastation" destroyed the Heartlands, leaving them evil and cursed, and split humanity in two. Many people survived, as elves and dwarves aided the humans by evacuating them either east or west to the empire's furthest provinces. Now, the West Coast is the primary homeland of humans (and where our campaigns will take place), but far to the east, the oriental human kingdoms of Mandarien, Saffur, and Shogurai, also exist. Unlike the eastern kingdoms, the west coast is split into a million small polities, petty kingdoms, theocracies and city-states, living in a constant cycle of war and political turmoil. The Gilded Republic of The Virean Islands is the preeminent power of the region, the only real country of significant power on the West Coast.

The Elves - The elves of Malveron faced a schism of their own in the aftermath of the Great Devastation. The traditional elven homeland is a valley named Caelbrand, from which the race originated, and a majority of them still reside there (if you don't count the 'Sun Elves'). However, many elves decided to stay with the humans after the evacuation of the Old Empire. This elven diaspora came in two varieties; the ones who enjoyed the humans' presence and decided to remain in elven enclaves in their cities; And those who saw the devastation human "progress" wrought on nature, and decided to seclude themselves in the forests to protect them. These two diasporic groups became the urban High Elves, and the Wood Elves of the forests. There are also other groups of elves out there, such as the Sun Elves of Zun'Atar, the Drow of the Underdark, and the eastern elves of Thale. These only have limited interactions with humans, however. Read more about each one on the map.

Dwarfkind - The dwarves of Malveron are divided into seven nations; The Longbeards, Proudhome, Wintermane, Stonekeeper, Redmantle, the Ice-Forged, and the desert-dwelling Dûr-Vazir.
The dwarven race originated in the Proudhome Mountains, where they still maintain their greatest empire. But in ages past, exiles and adventurers set out to find new ranges, and these brave settlers were the progenitors of the six other dwarf ethnicities. During The Great Devastation, the dwarves of Proudhome evacuated humans east, to what is now the oriental kingdoms, while the Longbeard dwarves helped the elves ferry people west.

The Halflings - The Halflings were native to the West Coast before the Old Empire occupied their territories long, long ago. Nowadays, they still live in the West Coast, in general harmony with its "newer" inhabitants. They tend to live in smaller, isolated villages, or on the road in caravans. Some of the greater human cities also have halfling slum quarters. Due to their size, they tend to ride ponies or even large dogs, instead of horses. Halfling ethnicities are as numerous and diverse as those of humans.

[Meta-Explanation - The original idea for Malveron was this: "Lets make a world that includes (almost) everything described in the 3.5 core rule books, and still have the world feel realistic, deep, and my own." So that's what I tried to do, and during this process, I found that this world would be absolutely terrifying to live in. Imagine if all these spells were real, all these monsters existed... the world would be extremely unforgiving and deadly. So that's what Malveron is like. A dark, lethal, and horrific place to live. And yet, goodness still endures in this world, kept alive by the gods and the good souls of Malveron's peoples. I also decided to make Malveron as low-magic as possible within the rules of the game, so that the terrifyingness of realistic magic would be maximized. So no floating towers or mass-produced magical artifacts. Magic is a big deal when it happens, and its fairly rare.]