I can only speak on Prydaen lore for these questions currently.. but here's the run down:

The Races of the West
Prydaen, Rakash, Human, and Olvi all came from the West. There are potentially others, but if there were, I haven't found the documentation to hint/support it. Humans and Olvi migrated east VERY early on, obviously, but originally, they are both from the West. Small numbers of Humans and Olvi remained in the western lands, all of whom perished in the Lyras situation (Lyras herself included).

Who did the Prydaen support before their Migration?
Prydaen had trade relations with the other three, but culturally did not intermingle and tended to stay in their own territories. The Prydaen at the time of the Rakash-Prydaen migration, had no strong ties to any race, but a small portion of them now have strong ties to Humans on Tref Bain. This is not a view kept by all Prydaen and is a rather unique situation.

Who do the Prydaen side with today?
As in game books have stated, before their migration, Prydaen were very aware of the other races and the other lands, but they didn't care to get involved. Western Prydaen culture was highly racial-centric. Boiling it down to, if it doesn't directly involve them or their safety and faith, they don't care. Likely even today, any traditional Prydaen would not side with either Humans nor Elves.

What about my roleplay?!
There's every bit of reason for a Prydaen that grew up among a particular race, especially one that's been treated like a pet rather than a sentient race, to side with the race they feel sympathetic towards, or even against if they've come to any kind of realization how mind-broken they've become due to being treated that way. It's also entirely possible for a Prydaen to feel strong loyalty to another race for some personal reason without having grown up as a "pet."

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NaOH+HI

>>I can only speak on Prydaen lore for these questions currently.. but here's the run down:

Mind blown on all of this, thanks for sharing!!

>>>>I could see an argument that with Rakash having land in Therengia they may exhibit more loyalties to Humans if a large scale war breaks out. Prydean, in Zoluren, may also affiliate with Humans. Maybe?

>>After the Elven-Human war was the Resistance War, and culturally it seems that the Provinces born of that have largely won out over racial loyalties. I think you're unlikely to see a racial war break out but if there were a large-scale war with one group vs something, most people are going to be loyal to the province they live in I would imagine. I.E. The Rakash of Siksraja would be loyal to the Baron, where as Rakash living somewhere near Zoluren would be loyal to the Prince and so on and so forth.

My thoughts on this are that while you'd likely have a PC who is a Rakash of Siksraja and loyal to the Baron, or a Rakash who is a citizen of Zoluren, that's only a small portion of Rakash in game. The vast majority are NPC and the question is, roughly, where they'd be located. If you look at the provinces you overlap with races rather easily ...

Therengia- Vastly Human overall. Rakash in Siksraja. Some S'kra Mur and Dwarves in the far north, which could be easily secessionist in an all out war.

Forfedhdar- Mostly Dwarven and Gor'Tog, two races that have traditionally allied. Ain Ghazal as Elven and either an area that could lean toward other Elven areas or play the role as a Casablanca, given it's unique government.

Zoluren- Mostly Human, some exceptions like Arthe Dale (Halfling), Stone Clan (Dwarven), and Leth Deriel (Elvish, the entire south of Zoluren seems vulnerable to Elvish takeover in a war).

Ilithi- Pretty solidly Elvish and Elothean.

Qi'Reshalia- S'Kra Mur outside of Hara'jaal and Mer'Kresh. And Mer'Kresh is set up as a sort of "We don't want to deal with your fighting."

The point being is that the provinces are not set up as equal mixtures of NPCs of each race. You could easily see a war between the provinces turning up into essentially a war between the races. The only real countervailing forces are-

1 - The Guilds, which operate as a way of linking some adventurers together across provincial or racial lines. But we've always been told that the Guilds can't really operate independently of the authorities that be. Would be interesting how they'd operate in a large scale war that divided their members.

2 - Zoluren vs. Therengia. At least from Elanthipedia, populations of the five provinces are given as:

* Forfedhdar: N/A (I'd love to know if this ever got figured out)
* Ilithi: 6,120,000
* Qi'Reshalia: 2,550,000
* Therengia: 4,680,000
* Zoluren: 5,000,000

You have a Dwarven/Gor'Tog province of unknown population, a decentralized archipelago with some heavy S'Kura Mur influences, and then three main powers: an Elothean-Elven power in the south, and two closely matched Human provinces with some internal diversity. Zoluren and Therengia probably keep themselves in balance and prevent any sort of grand Human alliance against everyone else. Figure out how the two consolidate, and, well, might not be pretty.

<<2 - Zoluren vs. Therengia. At least from Elanthipedia, populations of the five provinces are given as:
<<* Forfedhdar: N/A (I'd love to know if this ever got figured out)
<<* Ilithi: 6,120,000
<<* Qi'Reshalia: 2,550,000
<<* Therengia: 4,680,000
<<* Zoluren: 5,000,000

I believe those numbers are pre-Lyras since they're taken from a 2007 post and I don't think they've been edited to account for the war, so knock a good 30 to 40% of the number off of that due to the high death toll that Lyras resulted in. Although, Qi's numbers are probably still the same since she never made it to the islands.

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>> Forfedhdar- Mostly Dwarven and Gor'Tog, two races that have traditionally allied. Ain Ghazal as Elven and either an area that could lean toward other Elven areas or play the role as a Casablanca, given it's unique government.

I don't believe Ain Ghazal is really traditionally Elven, given that the Rose Sisters are multiracial and their first Lyba Khalo was a Dwarf -- but I might be mistaken. Forfedhdar also has the Nomads of the Arid Steppe, who are predominately Human and rather massive in terms of both territory and population but who don't mingle much with other people.

The main think about Forfehdhar is that it's largely decentralized. It's called "The Collective of Forfedhdar" because those are all sovereign groups that kind of do their own thing unless something is happening that affects the whole region. Arguably a war qualifies, but I think you'd find that quite a lot of the groups there would go "nope, not our problem" unless the violence spilled into that region for some reason.

> >Therengia- Vastly Human overall. Rakash in Siksraja. Some S'kra Mur and Dwarves in the far north, which could be easily secessionist in an all out war.

A small digression, and I can't speak to how official any of this is, but my toon at least generally treats the Therengian claim on the Velaka as nominal at best. It is effectively regarded near as I can tell as its own collection of sovereign peoples, even if you do end up paying Velakan taxes in Therengia in-game.

The Velaka is mainly S'Kra and Sand Elves, whatever races make up the Outcasts (mostly Elves and Humans I think), a scattering of nomadic Human tribes, and then you get the Dwarves of the Gemfire range which are more of a borderland between the southern Velaka and the rest of Therengia and which we know very little about.

This is just my perception, wheelbarrels of salt, etc. I'd be interested in knowing how much of this is accurate.

>> Zoluren- Mostly Human, some exceptions like Arthe Dale (Halfling), Stone Clan (Dwarven), and Leth Deriel (Elvish, the entire south of Zoluren seems vulnerable to Elvish takeover in a war).

Leth Deriel is an interesting case because they have traditionally been shielded from conflict by Sithsia, the Forest of Night, and the general impenetrability of the other forests around it. I'm not sure Leth Deriel has ever actually directly participated in a siege in any of the present wars now that I think about it. I know in several places it's been described as unassailable.

>> Ilithi- Pretty solidly Elvish and Elothean.

There's a rather large Human presence as well in the form of Shadow Clan. Don't know what proportion of the overall population of the province they are though; it's still definitely mostly Elothean and Elven, with (I believe) Elves having something of an edge in terms of sheer territory.

Re: Olvi, they're noted for being given a bit of everywhere back when the divvying up was happening, which is why you have strong Olvi presence in all but one of the mainland provinces. (P5 is a bit of a fluke.)

>> The point being is that the provinces are not set up as equal mixtures of NPCs of each race. You could easily see a war between the provinces turning up into essentially a war between the races.

Mmh that's true but I don't know that this indicates that you'd really see people fall into those lines unless the conflict were specifically focused on a region that has cultural significance, such as Leth Deriel. Particularly in the big populated areas people are more likely to throw in with the dominant cultural group rather than fall into racial lines, with the potential exception of some of the older and more traditionalist Elves and such -- which I'd argue probably aren't living in those population centers in the first place. In the past you've seen examples of inter- and intra-province conflict and there tend to be fewer racial overtones than you'd expect except when the right levers are present. Even the Outcast War wasn't really drawn on racial lines at all.

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Thayet
@thayelf // http://thayette.tumblr.com

"But you must know that if corruption is powerful enough, it's not corruption at all — it's law. Unspoken, unwritten, but law." — Robert Jackson Bennett, City of Stairs

It's been mentioned that ferries now travel at the speed of speed boats, and that what people can script between Riverhaven and The Crossing, makes foot speed the equivalent of a souped up car flooring it all the way between the two. We travel fast, yet people complain, about the travel times.

I'd rather like to see the speed slowed down. More magical passages put into place (and that means Moon Mages don't monopolize this with Moongates), and then off course there are special things, like the efficiency of a Ranger trail suddenly being more of a perk.

This in races, sorry I just digressed this. Carry on with the racial themed stuff.

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"I think anything that forces you to do something no sane adventurer would do just in order to train is ridiculous."
DR-SOCHARIS

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Victory Over Lyras, on the 397th year and 156 days since the Victory of Lanival the Redeemer.

>population density, et al.


Comparing modern cities...


Anchorage, Alaska is probably one of the most spread out major metropolitan areas I've ever been to. They have roughly 292,000 people in the "city" and about 396,000 in the metro area. It covers about 2,000 sq. miles (city) and 26,000 sq. miles (metro) covers. This gives population densities of 146ppl/sq. mile (city) and 15.2ppl/sq. miles (metro)

Rochester, New York has about the same population 210k (city), 1,080k (metro) and has a population density of 6,132ppl/sq. mile (city).


Just putting that out there.

I can totally imagine Crossing as being like Anchorage, an incorporation of fishing villages, ports, hinting lodges, clans, and a main central city.

Why would it? You can zoom across hundreds of miles in seconds on the trade routes. Distance really has no relation to time here, even before you start getting into Moon Mages.

-Armifer
"Perinthia's astronomers are faced with a difficult choice. Either they must admit that all their calculations were wrong ... or else they must reveal that the order of the gods is reflected exactly in the city of monsters." - Italo Calvino

You wouldn't even need RT. The game can already sort of track how fast you're moving. Move too quickly and you have to pause for a second to get a breather. It would help make horses useful too.

But that's unlikely to happen, funny as it would be.

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Thayet
@thayelf // http://thayette.tumblr.com

"But you must know that if corruption is powerful enough, it's not corruption at all — it's law. Unspoken, unwritten, but law." — Robert Jackson Bennett, City of Stairs

>You wouldn't even need RT. The game can already sort of track how fast you're moving. Move too quickly and you have to pause for a second to get a breather. It would help make horses useful too.

Now ask any player who uses the ice road how much they love it.

Players don't like artificial barriers to content. Skill based checks? Sure, whatever, it's a skill game (nominally). But flat mechanic barriers to 'you can never do this' suck.

Here's an on-topic question, combining the discussion on city sizes and provincial vs. racial wars.

My observation was that in general Therengia and Zoluren are pitched as Human-dominated provinced. Their provincial governmentes are in the hands of Humans. You have the random Halfling or Gor'Tog or Dwarf settlement, but they are exceptions. In contrast, Ilithi is presented as the Elothean and Elven province. Some exceptions, true.

But what is that in the big picture? When you look at the rural masses, is the population of Zoluren 55% Human? 70% Human? 85% Human?

We have four races that were introduced "recently" and I cannot imagine they make up a hefty portion of the population of the five provinces. 2% each? More or less? Concentrated in some provinces more than others?

Player demographics, IIRC, lean heavily toward Humans and Elves. But is that the same as the NPC population? My Rakash PC is probably a rarity both for being one of the less frequent PCs, but could also be seen as unusual by the NPCs. "Look, there's a Rakash!" sort of comments as she walks by.

In contrast I think Prydean make up a respectable share of PCs, but I see no reason why they'd be more common in the provinces population than Rakash. Unless there have been big gaps in fertility rates since migrating from the West.

5 Conflicts go in the Necromancer folders?

-Raesh

"It was wise enough to know itself, and brave enough to BE itself, and wild enough to change itself while somehow staying altogether true." ― The Slow Regard of Silent Things

>5 Conflicts go in the Necromancer folders?

Totally untrue, a falsehood. Necromancer folders are supposed to have ZERO tolerance for conflicts. Keep it civil there.

Crap, look what you did Raesh, you got this topic totally off track again, continue with the Racial themed things.

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"I think anything that forces you to do something no sane adventurer would do just in order to train is ridiculous."
DR-SOCHARIS

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Victory Over Lyras, on the 397th year and 156 days since the Victory of Lanival the Redeemer.

>>1 Geography stuff goes in the Geography folder.

>>2 Race-related issues go to the Race folder.

So if I want to know the population of the races by province I go to ... ?