Altheim

The world and continent of Altheim

The Southern States
Capital: Mul Ruled by: Pavel Fireforge, with a secondary council of delegates.

Key Values: independence, freedom of religion, trade and travel. Very pro-business.

The Southern States are a place where you can be anything you want: at least, that is how it is advertised. Many people find their start in the Southern States only to move on elsewhere. It's a capital of business, with institutions of sailing, science, religion and medicine thriving in their borders.

Their military is comprised of standard cohorts supported by a myriad of unusual mercenaries; barbarians, a dozen dragonborn, magisterial forces, the Purifiers of Byore, soldiers riding steppebeasts and and druidic support.

The Steppe Kingdoms of Thunderstone
Capital: Thunderstone

Ruled by: Beorn, son of Beorn. Absolute tribal monarchy.

Key Values: military strength, individual strength, monolithic culture, nomadism and travel.

Still beset by the beasts left behind by the Scar, still fighting modernisation despite the work of Beorn Senior of the Loose Ends, the Steppe Kingdoms of Thunderstone thrive upon their monolithic similiarities.

Tribal culture has largely survived the onslaught of education and technology, and the totems, spirit animals and vision quests that mark life in the steppe remain ever-present, existing alongside the Emerald Rail and airships.

The Solar Islands
Capital: Koshima

Ruled by: Otun Suoko the Wise, with representation from the other islands and Oestermark.

Key Values: pacifism, tradition, honour, isolationism and philosophy.

The denizens of the Solar Islands are no strangers to struggle and hardship, and consider their struggle the thing that has shaped them into a great nation. Ever troubled by war, internal strife, political conflict and deadly matters of honour and violence, the Solar Islands are far too concerned with their own matters to care much about the greater Continent.

Only Oestermark, a vassal town of the Solar Islands helmed by Otun Trystain, interacts with the old empire in any way other than trade and travel.

The Harvest Council
Capital: Hawick

Ruled by: The Harvest Council itself; land owners, airship captains, etc

Key Values: progressive acceptance of other cultures, fronteirsmanship, exploration and colonisation, agriculture and a bond with the earth you till, the simple life.

The Harvest Council is renowned for their agrarian know-how, their work ethic, and their sense of exploration. In a largely untamed wilderness, the towns of the Harvest Council stand as a testament to progressive acceptance and integration.

Nothing proves this more than their open attitude towards beings such as tieflings, and their allowing of worship of all forms, including demon pacts.

The Herdsman's Moot
Capital: New Atlan

Ruled by: Keira Broadhelm

Key values: self defence, a strong navy, and keeping their distance from the strangeness of the Wildlands above them.

Those who dwell and thrive in the lands around New Atlan are those who know how to survive. Hunters, wildmen, Earthkin, druids and shapeshifters live alongside workers and bakers, farmers and builders.

They are a suspicious people – with most of their lands having been ravaged by plagues, however, it is surprising to see that the rat-folk have integrated well into new Atlan. The Herdsman's Moot is a place where self sufficiency is prized above all, and people are expected to take care of themselves and their neighbours.

The Wild Lands
No data, currently a wild and untamed frontier land. Strange stones block the prayers of clerics, unusual wild folk stalk the landscape, and many of those who explore past the northernmost town of Eldergreen never return.

The Temple States of Whitehallow
Capital: Whitehallow

Ruled by: The Council of Ten, currently led by The Golden Herald, Adrik Forgeheart

Key Values: religion and piousness, faith, collectivism and the greater good, sacrifice of the self to further the needs of the many, charity and inflexible, rigid traditionalism.

The Temple States are the most pious lands, blessed by the Ten New Gods. With the breaking up of the religious exclusivity that Whitehallow once enjoyed, several sects have broken away from Whitehallow proper and, whilst they still pay tribute to Whitehallow and send delegates to their council, consider themselves separate and in the worship of one god.

The Halls of the Champion, for example, is a fortress town where soldiers retire to teach other young adventurers how to fight and serve. Lightfall is a place of purification and redemption set atop a waterfall high in the mountains, where the days are longest. Many such god-inspired towns dot the landscape of the Temple States.

The Vinyard Confederacy
Capital: Sarantja

Ruled by: House Dankleaf

Key Values: trade and economic power, soft power over others, militia training and swiss style militia of the people. Hatred of snakes. The most "Mediterranean" of the new states, eager to make alliances and colonise new areas.

Luxury is the keyword in Sarantja. It's a place of villas and landowners, where the wealthy live enjoying expensive hobbies, and the lower classes live well in the constant sunshine, under the watchful eye of landowners who answer to the ruling House Dankleaf

The Parliament of Blades
Capital: The Delve (formerly Bailey's Delve)

Ruled by: The Sandpit Council, warriors who must fight for their place on the council.

Key Values: individual strength, the Spartans of the setting. Complete freedom, anarchy, freedom from rules and no policing. Ultimate libertarianism, anybody can own anything and you keep what you can protect.

The Parliament of Blades has minimal infrastructure in their lands, being relatively new. It's a pirate-state, led by the toughest thugs and smartest assassins who kill their way to the top. Everybody has the opportunity to rule, if they are prepared to risk the ascent.

From the Last Call to the Gladelands, most of the Great Desert is ruled by these thugs, who have gathered just enough economic and political clout to demand that others recognise them – and who is going to invade the Great Desert to root out a potential trading partner? Even if they do still use slaves, sell drugs, and kill people for entertainment.

The Feylands
Capital: Moonglade

Ruled by: Archdruid Bretha Starkiller, representative of the Summer and Winter courts.

Key Values: magic and naturalism, druidism and planar exploration, inward exploration, etc. Very isolationist in their politics but happy to send people across the continent. Alien and with unknowable motives, nobody is very sure what to make of their magical, druidic ways.

Created after the defeat of the Devourer to give the Fey a mortal place to hide and live, the Feylands are a largely uncharted, completely wild land where animal, mortal, magic and fey live side by side.

Technology is shunned here, in favour of spiritualism, dreams, and the arcane. It is said that the Old Gods walk the forests of the Feylands – and that anybody who wanders in too far without permission, simply vanishes...

The Republic of Caladan
Capital: Caladan

Ruled by: The People's Chamber, the High Council, two chamber system.

Key Values: education, science, invention, trade, futurism, trying things before they are properly understood, intelligence agencies and spying, etc.

A technological powerhouse, the Republic of Caladan has survived by sheer bloody minded ingenuity and science, using their master of the arcane to endure countless invasions, rebellions, and coups.

Richer and more powerful than ever, Caladan's rulers seems content these days to focus on science and magic, leaving the world to do what it will. They did, after all, rule half the continent not long ago – and it didn't seem to go too well for them.

The Forgelands
Capital: Vaarentia

Ruled by: Envoy, a warforged ambassador who speaks for all golem-kind.

Values: research, understanding, data collection, science and experimentation, isolationism and secrecy.

After the Automaton Uprising and subsequent Golem War/Construct War, the Magisters of Caladan gifted the barren land south of the Freehold to the union of thinking, fighting and working machines. Many endured mandatory mind wipes and new writs in their heads to stop them from inflicting violence on any mortal.

So they have began to colonise the Scar. Their interests are primarily freedom, survival, and the answer to questions posed by their existence. This has led to allegations of questionable research within their borders. With no real need for farming, their lands are often called barren and unlivable.

The Freehold
Capital: None

Ruled by: None. Watched over by the Order of the Red Path, led by First Warden Anavald Grunheim.

The lands once called the Scar remain a dangerous frontier, largely uncharted, dependent on volunteers and convicts to protect its few settlers.

For two years of service in the military or guard, the Freehold offers land and freedom, plus a new name and clean record.

The Painted Savannah
Weird time. Does not like Warlocks.