South of the Spine...here there be bullgod worshiping mutant men?

I was thinking about south Aran'niel past the spine. I know this won't play a big part as far as RPing for a long time but it'd be good to get on record a general idea of what the fuck is happening down there.

Well, the consensus was always that there is no civilization south of the Spine (Was noted during the very first conception of RoKK and maintained). There are very few exceptions, where people from north of the Spine settled for various reasons, though there's been a large limiter on it.

Apparently, MN thought that there's no civilization CURRENTLY south of the Spine, but that there always was beforehand. This is not something I want to encourage, but I'm willing to hear MN's thoughts on the matter.

Well according to the History of the Orhal we had Tol Ancry on the broken islands as well as the Daegur and the Silvanos down there.

Both the Daegur and the Silvanos are long gone though. That's even according to your lore if I'm not mistaken. They're also almost a myth (Since you never publish anything based on solid fact).

Yes. They disappeared shortly after The Fall. But that would contradict your point that there was never civilization there. I agree with both you and MN that no civilization exists there now.

My idea for it was rather indepth and would require almost it's own topic to cover fully, suffice to say I thought I pretty much had free reign to do with it as I wanted, for multiple reasons (read: misunderstandings, miscommunications[read: no communications], all of which I take all blame that is due myself).

I'll write something up with top priority when I get an opening in the Crusade rp.

Okay, I have a question. How in the hell did the Fall have anything to do with the collapse of the south? It didn't affect them at all. There were no major repercussions, no land-changing events, and the undead didn't even reach that far. Why do you both seem to think the Fall is what triggered the demise of the south?

Well why don't you post your thoughts here since we already have a thread on it? For the moment here are my what I had outlined for the south.

1. Orhal which occupied parts of the Spine around and west of Imperator as well as territory south and west of Imperator. As tribal hordes there would just be territory where they happened to be not necessarily where they dominated. In other words just because certain parts of Aran'niel are marked where Orhal exist doesn't mean other factions can't be there in significant numbers.

2. Part of the great forest southeast of the Spine would be present to secret hidden enclaves of the Silvanos. Far flung in the distant future musing had thought about the enclaves revealing themselves to the world and having the rebirth of the avatar Cirion the Wrath attempting to reconquer Aran'niel.

3. Abandoned Daegur ruins throughout the southern spine now crumbling and in complete decay as a testament to the old Daegur Empire. Various barbarians and wildmen might use these places for shelter and camps.

The current potential retcon would have the Fall be a global catastrophe that would have caused fissures and earthquakes that would have affected all of Aran'niel not just the north. And besides their disappeared during the Fall is more of a contributng factor than the actual cause.

Okay here's an attempt at a very basic, abridged version of the idea I had running (apparently silently) in my head for the last 4 years or so.

In the dawn of civilization the Spirit Lord of Southern Ara'niel decided to be a little more 'hands on' with the way he handled his charges, then was traditionally acceptable among the Spirits. Thus he went through great pains to ensure the isolation of his realm, even as his subordinates walked the fledgling civilizations of man, in the guise of benevolent men of wisdom and great power, always draped in distinctive robes of white.

These spirits in disguise made their rounds with the regularity of the moons, steadily nurtured their society, always stopping short of just solving problems themselves, they were there as respected advisers more or less.

Another role they fulfilled was the collection of Mana sensitives taking those who elected too, which almost all did with rare exception, away to be trained in the use of their gifts, which was more or less a unique form of mana manipulation that made more to do with augmenting oneself physical attributes temporarily with a mixture of mana and the users own life energy (Which was more exercised then exerted out right) creating a much more stable 'mage' then their northern counterparts, closer to a warrior monk then a mage in the traditional sense.

Civilization thusly progressed almost independent of magic, and the havok that goes with it. Three powerful Nations rise, mastering many a technology reaching an almost Victorian era level.

Occasional wars are fought, all with utmost civility when compared to wars elsewhere, but generally all is peaceful stable, and happy.

And then came the monsters, pouring out of the spine, reeking all manner of hell as the spirits, and the mana sensatives they had been gathering for the last few thousands years went to work making sure all their hard work was not spoiled...

It went well initally until Orgshanku, a spawn of the Progenator himself, slew the Southern Spirit Lord in single Combat, making his corpse the center piece of his Crown of Horns.

At which point, seeing as no one could effectively stop him, he sort've just waltzed into the central most Kingdom and made himself at home (read: turned the royal palace into his royal throne) his creatures tearing through it, gathering people up for a little experiment of his own, altering the people as he himself had been altered, creating minor beasts out of them, as many as a thousand at a time.

Thus altered at the physical mental level, he had almost the entire population of a nation in the palm of his hand almost over night, sending them out en mass to kill in his name, their undeniable numbers, augmented biology, and the support of his monsterous horde running rough shot over the best and boldest of the Southern armies, who for their part managed to drag their inevitable demise out for a few hundred years.

Eventually the taters of their civilization all scurried to the west, etching out a fearful existence on what had been the fringes of one of their former civilization of which only the great monastery fortresses of the Spirit's human students still stand, caught in a dead locked, bloody siege that continues to wage in fits to this day.

In fact the only reason that Orgshanku stopped his advance was fear of stirring attention from the other spirits, and thus leaving himself vulnerable to his father, who was looking him with increasingly dangerous eyes as of late...

The rest as they say is history.

CromTheConqueror wrote:Well why don't you post your thoughts here since we already have a thread on it? For the moment here are my what I had outlined for the south.

1. Orhal which occupied parts of the Spine around and west of Imperator as well as territory south and west of Imperator. As tribal hordes there would just be territory where they happened to be not necessarily where they dominated. In other words just because certain parts of Aran'niel are marked where Orhal exist doesn't mean other factions can't be there in significant numbers.

Sounds fine so far.

2. Part of the great forest southeast of the Spine would be present to secret hidden enclaves of the Silvanos. Far flung in the distant future musing had thought about the enclaves revealing themselves to the world and having the rebirth of the avatar Cirion the Wrath attempting to reconquer Aran'niel.

When Age asked if she could have her people in that forest, were the only ones present REALLY me, Age, and Bronx of all people? Seriously. I thought both you and MN were around.

3. Abandoned Daegur ruins throughout the southern spine now crumbling and in complete decay as a testament to the old Daegur Empire. Various barbarians and wildmen might use these places for shelter and camps.

That sounds fine.

MidgetNinja wrote:Civilization thusly progressed almost independent of magic, and the havok that goes with it. Three powerful Nations rise, mastering many a technology reaching an almost Victorian era level.

But never exploring? Or were they prevented from doing so?

Eventually the taters of their civilization all scurried to the west, etching out a fearful existence on what had been the fringes of one of their former civilization of which only the great monastery fortresses of the Spirit's human students still stand, caught in a dead locked, bloody siege that continues to wage in fits to this day.

Cool story.

Chaos I'm unsure whether your last "cool story" was sarcasm or not. You seem to be using a lot of that today. As for Age, I was there, but it didn't really conflict what I had in mind. The forest is hella huge and Nacatha just had one village. The Silvanos hidden enclaves would have no problem being there at the same time (though if we ever did enact the story arc I imagined Nacatha's village would probably be the first to go).

Admin wrote:
But never exploring? Or were they prevented from doing so?

It wasn't so much prevented as actively discouraged, via a few well chosen words from their friendly neighbor hood advisers. I imagine they also went to great lengths to 'dissuade' anyone who did not heed this friendly advice, monstrous illusions conjured by god like entities can be quite convincing...

CromTheConqueror wrote:Chaos I'm unsure whether your last "cool story" was sarcasm or not. You seem to be using a lot of that today. As for Age, I was there, but it didn't really conflict what I had in mind. The forest is hella huge and Nacatha just had one village. The Silvanos hidden enclaves would have no problem being there at the same time (though if we ever did enact the story arc I imagined Nacatha's village would probably be the first to go).

I didn't mean it as sarcasm. It actually sounds pretty neat, humanity clinging onto existence by residing in age old bastions, constantly reminded of previous glory but never able to grasp it again.

As long as it jives with Age and everything works out right, I don't really have a problem with it.

MidgetNinja wrote:It wasn't so much prevented as actively discouraged, via a few well chosen words from their friendly neighbor hood advisers. I imagine they also went to great lengths to 'dissuade' anyone who did not heed this friendly advice, monstrous illusions conjured by god like entities can be quite convincing...

Fair enough. No contact with the north works, and as long as the civilizations were contained and now hardly exist, it sounds fine to me. I'd really like formal articles though so we can talk about specifics.

Okay. Tomorrow lets go ahead and all lay out our general vision for what it looks like south of the spine. For its history lets go ahead and use the timeline we used for the Great War thread to break up the history into manageable blocks.

Now do you mean your timeline, my timeline, or would you rather we create a timeline unique to the Southlands specifically for sorting this out?

I would suggest my timeline insofar as the names. Age of Terror, Age of War, Age of Night ect. ect.