Shared world races:

[rust]

Something more fantasy-like ... "Masters of the Trees' Bounty" ... ah, no ...
fantasy obviously is not my field.
As for the way the products are made and work, I fully agree.

P.S.: I have added the Nifara to the list. I have also moved the list to the
wiki, so that it is more easy to find, and others can edit it, too.

[soltakss]

Originally Posted by Puck

Where I was in a bit of a quandary was where I should place the new stuff I was writing, knowing that it may vary somewhat from Soltakss vision and description.

Put it in the Green and I'll edit Peoples of the Green accordingly. After all, the Green is yours and I was just proposing some ideas.

[soltakss]

What do people think about the Steppe? Assuming, of course, that we have a large area of steppe/savannah, who should be in it?

We have horse-riding barbarians from the Portal writeup coming from the north. The nothern steppe seems the obvious place for them.

What about other riders? We know about the Beast Riders of Prax (Glorantha) and something similar might be interesting. In the real world, we have camel-riders, reindeer-riders, buffalo-riders and elephant-riders and I think that many of these would fit quite nicely.

In the far north you could have reindeer-riders/herders and even mammoth-riders, Wooly-Rhino-riders or musk-ox-riders roaming the tundra. On the steppe proper you could have something similar to the Praxian Beast Riders. Where steppe turns into desert, camel-riders would be more natural.

Unlike Prax or Pent in Glorantha or the Eurasian Steppe in the real world, I wouldn't give these the same culture. Sure, they are animal riding nomads but they wouldn't worship the same gods, wouldn't have the same heroes and wouldn't share the same customs.

I'd even have different types of horse barbarians, some fully nomadic, some semi-nomadic and some sedentary, in different areas of the steppe.

[rust]

I think animal-riding tribes are a logical idea for steppes and deserts, and I
am really looking forward to seeing your ideas.

[Puck]

After all, the Green is yours and I was just proposing some ideas.

I think things can work pretty well together though. Right from the start I was making the Green as a small place, about the size of Dragon Pass with an open ended southern part for future growth. On the world map the Green was much much larger than I originally imagined though. That allows plenty of space for it to grow into details. The volcanos and the more developed areas fit there very nicely. I will kind of focus with variable ideas on the northern-west corner which is futher from civilization.

[Puck]

What about other riders? We know about the Beast Riders of Prax (Glorantha) and something similar might be interesting. In the real world, we have camel-riders, reindeer-riders, buffalo-riders and elephant-riders and I think that many of these would fit quite nicely.

Wew! Big big question there. I think it is extremely important for the shared world. Riding strange creatures is a staple of high fantasy worlds. It was one of the first things that caught my eye with Runequest and I have never lost my love of the Praxian nomads. It is important to make sure ours are somehow different though, perhaps here more than anywhere.

I thought of people riding large almost monkey-like creatures in the Green and then shied away. Seemed a little to much like the Star Wars thing in Jabba’s basement ( I think the novels had people riding them in swamps or jungles). Instead I think those hippo-like water lizards may work the best: (humpback lizards). When I get a chance I will write them up.

I like the Mammoth rider idea.

One idea for barbarians would be to ride Rams (I think they are actually called big horn sheep). They are very sure footed in the mountains and look cool.

Another Idea is to have people ride land dragons( natural creatures, not real dragons or orms), big, long, drawn-out, tailed, camel (for lack of a closer animal) looking lizards, with legs down for striding rather than splayed like a real lizard. Two or three people could ride them and they could strap all their living essentials to them. These would work well for plains type nomads or even merchants and caravans.

Possibly the same as above, but a hairless mammal with skin like a rhino or elephant instead of a lizard.

I have always liked the idea of a bipedal lizards as a primary mount.

Side note: I never found many details on the bolo lizard people in Prax. Are there any pictures of them anywhere?

I agree that how we present these mounts and wrap them into culture is just as important as what they look like physically. Weird beasts would not have to be reserved for barbarians either. For instance, we could make the lizards, bipedal and land dragon, the preferred mount of civilized people, horses or mammals could even be uncouth barbaric beasts.

When inventing new creatures, it sure would be nice to have a good artist doing concept sketches. When I am reading stuff like this in game-books one good inking will sell me hook line and sinker.

[rust]

In the Traveller universe the Syleans once used to ride eight-legged lizards,
looking somewhat like a brontosaurus (long tail, long neck, small head), but
with a head more like a pterosaurus (long "beak", sharp teeth). Such a beast
(named a "poni" - misunderstandings programmed ...) was about 8 Meters
long, from (outstretched) head to (outstretched) tail, with the body half of
the length, and could probably carry at least two humans.

[frogspawner]

I like the idea of mammoth, woolly rhino and musk-ox riders. And camels, certainly. I think I mentioned Moa-riders before (you know, the now-extinct giant flightless birds from New Zealand), or possibly Giant Dodo's? Continuing the prehistoric (but post-dinosaur) theme, maybe sabre-tooth tigers, similar to the wargs from the LotR films (easy to find figures!). And of course, various types of frogs...

PS: For realism's sake, maybe have mammalian ones from one continent, and reptilian from another?

[Rurik]

Hows this for a wacky thought (just poo-poo me away if I am getting too off kilter here ) - Intelligent riding beasts who are the masters of their riders. They are smart and possibly have magical/psychic abilities but alas have no opposible thumbs, so use humans (or another race) to do things like construct things like armor and shelter and ride on their backs and shoot arrows and use long spears.

[rust]

Well, why not ?
With a really good description this could make a very interesting combination
of races, somewhat like dragons and dragonriders in other game worlds.
I would not consider it off kilter, only rather difficult to describe in a way
that makes it plausible and convincing.
However, if you have the necessary ideas: Please do it !